Emerging behaviours in artificial societies: simulating social-economic phenomena

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dc.contributor.authorIngram, Branden Corwin
dc.date.accessioned2019-04-05T12:04:01Z
dc.date.available2019-04-05T12:04:01Z
dc.date.issued2018
dc.descriptionA research report submitted in partial fulfilment to the degree of School of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics, University of the Witwatersrand, 2018
dc.description.abstractThe behaviour of a society and its individuals is inherently complex and, therefore it becomes difficult when trying to model how changes in a society will affect that population. This dissertation presents an implementation of a computer simulation technique known as an Artificial Society, which is used to model social-economic phenomena using a multi-agent system. An Artificial Society is a system of simulated agents in a simulated world governed by a set of rules which handle the nature of the interactions between entities of the system. The purpose of this model is to analyse the emergence of global behaviours that form from the evolution of the society as a result of interactions governed by simple rules. We firstly expand on a number of aspects of the work done by Epstein and Axtell [1996] such as trade and cultural transmission. We analyse the similarities of our model with that of pre-existing models such as the Predator-Prey model. We demonstrate the spread of culture through a society and investigate the influence an individual can have on a population in different environments. We also investigate and analyse the benefits and shortfalls that different kinds of trade, taxation and investment can have on a society in a 3 resource environment. Through all of these experiments, we were able to demonstrate the emergence of complex behaviours which formed as a result of the interactions of individuals. This approach of modelling whereby we generate simple rules and observe the emergence of global behaviour is gives us the ability to tackle modelling complex behaviours where using a closed form solution would be impractical. It is hoped that this study will inform readers on the potentials and benefits of Artificial Societies.en_ZA
dc.description.librarianXL2019en_ZA
dc.format.extentOnline resource (124 pages)
dc.identifier.citationIngram, Branden Corwin, (2018) Emerging behaviours in artificial societies: simulating social-economic phenomena, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, https://hdl.handle.net/10539/26704.
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10539/26704
dc.language.isoenen_ZA
dc.subject.lcshComputer simulation
dc.subject.lcshMultiagent systems
dc.titleEmerging behaviours in artificial societies: simulating social-economic phenomenaen_ZA
dc.typeThesisen_ZA
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