Training Innovations for Nonverbal Cue Decoding

The current emphasis on SSTR and COIN operations often places a soldier in close, interpersonal roles while building schools, training police, etc…. Many operations involve establishing rapport and discerning intent in close proximity to friendly and possibly dangerous individuals. Unfortunately, the typical American Soldier not only deals with unfamiliar, non-Western environments, but has little to no facility with the local language and relies heavily on interpreters who can have dubious motivations. A plethora of military anecdotal evidence supports the importance of interpreting NVB in these settings. We propose an innovative classroom and stand-alone computer based curriculum consisting of seven modules to train Soldiers to interpret nonverbal behavior.