and neuroticism. Prior to internet-based data tracking, the only way to obtain that type of sensitive psychological data would have been for an individual to elect to respond to a detailed personality questionnaire. (9) According to a study published by the National Academy of Sciences, computers can predict an individual’s latent personality traits better than humans. Specifically, researchers found that a computer needed only 10 social media impressions to better predict an individual’s responses to a personality questionnaire than a coworker, 70 for a cohabitant or friend, 150 for a family member, and 300 for a spouse. (10) Communications tailored to an individual’s unique personality traits are designed to manipulate cognitive function rather than to persuade via appeals to rational decision making. A forthcoming publication by Julie E. Cohen titled Between Truth and Power describes the phenomenon as follows The operation of the digital information environment has begun to mimic the operation of the collection of brain structures that mid-twentieth-century neurologists christened the limbic system and that play vital roles in a number of precognitive functions, including emotion, motivation, and habit-formation, and observed that today’s networked information flows are optimized to produce what social psychologist Shoshana Zuboff calls instrumentarian power: They employ a radical behaviorist approach to human psychology to mobilize and reinforce patterns of motivation, cognition, and behavior that operate on automatic, near-instinctual levels and that may be manipulated instrumentally . (11) According to numerous studies, messages tailored to an individual’s unique personality traits are materially more effective at altering an individual’s behavior. (12) A recent study published in the National Academy of Sciences found that it is possible to conduct psychological manipulation efforts online that are targeted and customized to each individual’s unique personality traits on a national scale. (13) Candidates,