Abstract:

We present a new modelling approach for complex systems incorporating a dynamic environment and individuals with agency. We do this through multiple models at different levels. We develop a common meta-model for these kinds of models. The meta-model captures the concepts of agents moving and interacting on a dynamic network, to provide the power of an agent based model situated in the context of a dynamic and changing environment. The addition of context allows us to isolate the decision process of the agent from the constraints and resources provided by the environment, so we can consider separately the effect of changes in the environment from changes in the agents’ decision process, and changes caused by agents acting differently based on their learning from, and adapting to, the changed environment.

We develop a generalised platform model for implementing different complex systems conforming to the meta-model. We illustrate the approach by developing a domain model for a particular system of interest, a simplified model of declining mobility, which we use to guide the specialisation of the generic platform model to an implementation and to perform simulation experiments.

@inproceedings(Rainford2020:ALife:fall,
  author = "Penny Faulkner Rainford and Susan Stepney and Yasmin Merali",
  title = "Socio-Physical Modelling and Declining Mobility",  
  pages = "104-112",
  doi = "10.1162/isal_a_00270",
  crossref = "ALife-2020"
)

@proceedings(ALife-2020,
  title = "ALife 2020, Montreal, Canada (virtual), July 2020",
  booktitle = "ALife 2020, Montreal, Canada (virtual), July 2020",
  publisher = "MIT Press",
  year = 2020
)