On agent-based modeling and computational social science

In the first part of the paper, the field of agent-based modeling (ABM) is discussed focusing on the role of generative theories, aiming at explaining phenomena by growing them. After a brief analysis of the major strengths of the field some crucial weaknesses are analyzed. In particular, the generative power of ABM is found to have been underexploited, as the pressure for simple recipes has prevailed and shadowed the application of rich cognitive models. In the second part of the paper, the renewal of interest for Computational Social Science (CSS) is focused upon, and several of its variants, such as deductive, generative, and complex CSS, are identified and described. In the concluding remarks, an interdisciplinary variant, which takes after ABM, reconciling it with the quantitative one, is proposed as a fundamental requirement for a new program of the CSS.

[1]  Paul Lukowicz,et al.  Towards a living earth simulator , 2012, The European Physical Journal Special Topics.

[2]  Allen Newell,et al.  Computer science as empirical inquiry: symbols and search , 1976, CACM.

[3]  Dirk Helbing,et al.  Agent-Based Modeling , 2012 .

[4]  Eric Bonabeau,et al.  Agent-based modeling: Methods and techniques for simulating human systems , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[5]  Andrew M. Colman,et al.  The complexity of cooperation: Agent-based models of competition and collaboration , 1998, Complex..

[6]  S. Salthe.  Varieties of emergence , 1991 .

[7]  Mohammad Ali Rastegar,et al.  Agent-based Modeling and Simulation of Competitive Wholesale Electricity Markets , 2010 .

[8]  Joshua M. Epstein,et al.  Generative Social Science , 2006 .

[9]  Alan G. Isaac.  The ABM Template Models: A Reformulation with Reference Implementations , 2011, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[10]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Intelligent agents: theory and practice , 1995, The Knowledge Engineering Review.

[11]  Herbert A. Simon,et al.  Computer Science as Empirical Inquiry , 2011 .

[12]  John R. Williams,et al.  An events based algorithm for distributing concurrent tasks on multi-core architectures , 2010, Comput. Phys. Commun..

[13]  Michael Batty,et al.  SERIES Key Challenges in Agent-Based Modelling for GeoSpatial Simulation , 2007 .

[14]  H. Van Dyke Parunak,et al.  Agent-Based Modeling vs. Equation-Based Modeling: A Case Study and Users' Guide , 1998, MABS.

[15]  Giulia Andrighetto,et al.  What Do Agent-Based and Equation-Based Modelling Tell Us About Social Conventions: The Clash Between ABM and EBM in a Congestion Game Framework , 2010, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[16]  José Manuel Galán,et al.  Appearances Can Be Deceiving: Lessons Learned Re-Implementing Axelrod's 'Evolutionary Approach to Norms' , 2005, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[17]  Paul Windrum,et al.  Empirical Validation of Agent-Based Models: Alternatives and Prospects , 2007, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[18]  Alessandro Vespignani,et al.  Epidemic spreading in scale-free networks. , 2000, Physical review letters.

[19]  R. Gorvett.  Why Stock Markets Crash: Critical Events in Complex Financial Systems , 2005 .

[20]  Claudio Cioffi-Revilla,et al.  Invariance and universality in social agent-based simulations , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[21]  Gennaro Di Tosto,et al.  Cooperation through communication: Agent-based models and experimental results , 2009 .

[22]  Tao Zhou,et al.  Epidemic spreading on heterogeneous networks with identical infectivity , 2007 .

[23]  P. Dent.  Animal Spirits – How Human Psychology Drives the Economy, and Why it Matters for Global Capitalism , 2010 .

[24]  Warren Thorngate,et al.  Minding Norms: Mechanisms and Dynamics of Social Order in Agent Societies (Oxford Series on Cognitive Models and Architectures) by Rosaria Conte, Giulia Andrighetto and Marco Campennl (eds.) , 2014, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[25]  Francesco Ciari,et al.  Large-scale agent-based travel demand optimization applied to Switzerland, including mode choice , 2010 .

[26]  Mario Paolucci,et al.  On Agent Based Modelling and Computational Social Science , 2011 .

[27]  C. Badcock,et al.  Simulating Societies: The Computer Simulation of Social Phenomena , 1995 .

[28]  A. Colman,et al.  The complexity of cooperation: Agent-based models of competition and collaboration , 1998, Complex..

[29]  K. Sigmund,et al.  Evolution of Indirect Reciprocity by Image Scoring/ The Dynamics of Indirect Reciprocity , 1998 .

[30]  Cje Castle,et al.  Ucl Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis Principles and Concepts of Agent-based Modelling for Developing Geospatial Simulations Principles and Concepts of Agent-based Modelling for Developing Geospatial Simulations 1.2.4.2: Guidelines for Choosing a Simulation / Modelling System .................24 , 2022 .

[31]  M. Nowak,et al.  Evolution of indirect reciprocity by image scoring , 1998, Nature.

[32]  Michael Wooldridge,et al.  Programming Multi-Agent Systems in AgentSpeak using Jason (Wiley Series in Agent Technology) , 2007 .

[33]  Joshua M. Epstein,et al.  Generative Social Science: Studies in Agent-Based Computational Modeling (Princeton Studies in Complexity) , 2007 .

[34]  Guillaume Deffuant,et al.  Mixing beliefs among interacting agents , 2000, Adv. Complex Syst..

[35]  Rosaria Conte,et al.  Gossip for social control in natural and artificial societies , 2012, Simul..

[36]  Robert W. Zmud,et al.  An Empirical Validation of , 1987 .

[37]  Frank Dignum,et al.  Simulation of intermediation using rich cognitive agents , 2010, Simul. Model. Pract. Theory.

[38]  R. Boyd,et al.  The evolution of altruistic punishment , 2003, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[39]  Robert L. Axtell,et al.  Population growth and collapse in a multiagent model of the Kayenta Anasazi in Long House Valley , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[40]  G. Nigel Gilbert,et al.  Simulation for the social scientist , 1999 .

[41]  Andrea Zaccaria,et al.  Minimal agent based model for financial markets I , 2008, 0808.3562.

[42]  Rainer Hegselmann,et al.  Opinion dynamics and bounded confidence: models, analysis and simulation , 2002, J. Artif. Soc. Soc. Simul..

[43]  Santo Fortunato.  Damage spreading and opinion dynamics on scale-free networks , 2005 .

[44]  Corinna Elsenbroich,et al.  Construct Validity and Theoretical Embeddedness of Agent-based Models of Normative Behaviour , 2010 .

[45]  Mario Paolucci,et al.  Altruism among Simple and Smart Vampires , 2007, Int. J. Cooperative Inf. Syst..

[46]  Lubos Buzna,et al.  Self-Organized Pedestrian Crowd Dynamics: Experiments, Simulations, and Design Solutions , 2005, Transp. Sci..

[47]  Dirk Helbing,et al.  How to Do Agent-Based Simulations in the Future: From Modeling Social Mechanisms to Emergent Phenomena and Interactive Systems Design , 2013 .

[48]  S. Galam.  Minority opinion spreading in random geometry , 2002, cond-mat/0203553.

[49]  Scott Heckbert.  Calibration of agent-based models in ecological economics , 2010 .

[50]  John R. Williams,et al.  Smooth particle hydrodynamics simulations of low Reynolds number flows through porous media , 2011 .

[51]  J. Giles.  Social science lines up its biggest challenges , 2011, Nature.

[52]  Lada A. Adamic,et al.  Computational Social Science , 2009, Science.

[53]  C. Bicchieri.  The grammar of society: the nature and dynamics of social norms , 2005 .

[54]  Dirk Helbing,et al.  Simulating dynamical features of escape panic , 2000, Nature.

[55]  Shan Huang.  Next-generation transportation simulation and modeling tools , 2011 .

[56]  Rosaria Conte,et al.  Agent-based modeling for understanding social intelligence , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[57]  J. Casti.  Would-Be Worlds: How Simulation Is Changing the Frontiers of Science , 1996 .

[58]  Walter Quattrociocchi,et al.  Simulating opinion dynamics in heterogeneous communication systems , 2010 .

[59]  R. Hegselmann,et al.  Simulating Social Phenomena , 1997 .

[60]  Philip Ball,et al.  The physical modelling of society: a historical perspective , 2002 .

[61]  Amirali Salehi-Abari,et al.  THE EXPLOITATION-RESISTANT TRUST (ERT) MODEL FOR OPEN DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS , 2009 .

[62]  A. Pentland,et al.  Computational Social Science , 2009, Science.

[63]  Dan Chen,et al.  A Grid Aware Large Scale Agent-based Simulation System , 2009 .

[64]  R. Axelrod.  The Complexity of Cooperation , 2011 .

[65]  Rosario N. Mantegna,et al.  An Introduction to Econophysics: Contents , 1999 .

[66]  Kai Nagel,et al.  Policy Evaluation in Multiagent Transport Simulations , 2010 .

[67]  Dirk Helbing,et al.  From social simulation to integrative system design , 2010, ArXiv.

[68]  Joseph M. Whitmeyer,et al.  Social Emergence: Societies as Complex Systems , 2006 .

[69]  S. Fortunato,et al.  Statistical physics of social dynamics , 2007, 0710.3256.

[70]  Rosario N. Mantegna,et al.  Book Review: An Introduction to Econophysics, Correlations, and Complexity in Finance, N. Rosario, H. Mantegna, and H. E. Stanley, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2000. , 2000 .

[71]  Helder Coelho,et al.  On How to Conduct Experimental Research with Self-Motivated Agents , 2002, RASTA.

[72]  Ilias Sakellariou,et al.  Enhancing NetLogo to Simulate BDI Communicating Agents , 2008, SETN.

[73]  Dirk Helbing,et al.  Fundamental and Real-World Challenges in Economics , 2010, 1012.4446.

[74]  R. Axelrod,et al.  The Complexity of Cooperation: Agent-Based Models of Competition and Collaboration , 1998 .

[75]  Thomas C. Schelling,et al.  Dynamic models of segregation , 1971 .

[76]  Claudio Cioffi-Revilla,et al.  Computational social science , 2010 .

[77]  Robert J. Lempert,et al.  Making Computational Social Science Effective , 2002 .

[78]  Michael W. Macy,et al.  Generative Social Science: Studies in Agent‐Based Computational Modeling. By Joshua M. Epstein. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2007. Pp. 352. $49.50. , 2008 .

[79]  Andrew Reeson,et al.  Agent‐based modeling in ecological economics , 2010, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences.

[80]  Hans Jochen Scholl,et al.  Agent-based and system dynamics modeling: a call for cross study and joint research , 2001, Proceedings of the 34th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences.

[81]  Jordi Sabater-Mir,et al.  Reputation-based decisions for logic-based cognitive agents , 2010, Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems.

[82]  Rosaria Conte,et al.  From Simulation to Theory (and Backward) , 2009, EPOS.

[83]  N. Gilbert,et al.  Artificial Societies: The Computer Simulation of Social Life , 1995 .