Standardised and transparent model descriptions for agent-based models: Current status and prospects

Müller, Birgit; Balbi, Stefano; Buchmann, Carsten M.; Sousa, Luís de; Dreßler, Gunnar; Groeneveld, Jürgen; Klassert, Christian; Le, Quang Bao; Millington, James D.A.; Nolzen, Henning; Parker, Dawn C.; Polhill, Gary; Schlüter, Maja; Schulze, Jule; Schwarz, Nina; Sun, Zhanli; Taillandier, Patrick; Weise, Hanna

doi:10.1016/j.envsoft.2014.01.029

Cited by 81 publications

(58 citation statements)

References 49 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Useful discussions of this issue can be found in [An, 2012;Grimm et al, 2010;Müller et al, 2014;Tesfatsion, 2016p]. See, also, Wallace et al [2015] for an exceptionally thoughtful attempt to develop presentation and evaluation protocols for agent-based models designed for policy purposes.…”

Section: Formentioning

confidence: 99%

Elements of Dynamic Economic Modeling: Presentation and Analysis

Tesfatsion

2017

Eastern Econ J

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The primary goal of these introductory notes is to promote the clear presentation and rigorous analysis of dynamic economic models, whether expressed in equation or agent-based form. A secondary goal is to promote the use of state-space modeling with its respect for historical process, for cause leading to effect without top-down imposition of global constraints. If economic modelers truly wish to respect the rationality of decision-makers, they should have the courage of their convictions; they should not be doing for their modeled decision-makers what in reality these decision-makers must do for themselves. These notes on dynamic economic modeling are designed for self-study by graduate students of economics. The focus is on general presentation and analysis principles for dynamic economic models expressible by means of state space models in initial value form.The state of a modeled system at any given time is a characterization of system aspects deemed by the modeler to be relevant for a speci ed purpose. Typically the only aspects 1 explicitly included in the state are aspects that can change over time; xed aspects are suppressed for ease of notation. For an economic system, the state typically includes the asset holdings, information, and beliefs of economic entities such as rms, consumers, and government policy makers.Hereafter, state space model will refer exclusively to a state space model in initial value form, that is, to a model that speci es how the state of a system changes over time, starting from a given state at an initial time t 0 [Aström and Murray, 2008, Ch. 2]. Roughly described, given any time t ≥ t 0 and time increment ∆t > 0, the state realized at time t + ∆t is postulated to be a function of the state realized at time t together with all inputs to the system between t and t + ∆t, where the inputs can include controls and random event realizations.These functional relationships are conditioned on exogenously speci ed functional forms and parameter values.

show abstract

Section: Formentioning

confidence: 99%

Elements of Dynamic Economic Modeling: Presentation and Analysis

Tesfatsion

2017

Eastern Econ J

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Moreover, the major findings of a simulation study often are to be differentiated with respect to parameter settings within a given study, which makes it even more difficult to be conclusive without providing too many details (Axelrod 1997a). In order to overcome these somewhat ''built-in'' problems of simulationbased research, there is a strong claim to make use of standardization-be it in the process of simulation modeling, in the data structures or in the algorithms (Richiardi et al 2006;Lorscheid et al 2012;Müller et al 2014). …”

Section: Abm As Simulation-based Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agent-based modeling in managerial science: an illustrative survey and study

Wall

2014

Rev Manag Sci

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This article provides an overview of the current state of agent-based modeling in managerial science. In particular, the aim is to illustrate major lines of development in agent-based modeling in the field and to highlight the opportunities and limitations of this research approach. The article employs a twofold approach: First, a survey on research efforts employing agent-based simulation models related to domains of managerial science is given which have benefited considerably from this research method. Second, an illustrative study is conducted in the area of management accounting research, a domain which, so far, has rarely seen agentbased modeling efforts. In particular, we introduce an agent-based model that allows to investigate the relation between intra-firm interdependencies, performance measures used in incentive schemes, and accounting accuracy. We compare this model to a study which uses both, a principal-agent model and an empirical analysis. We find that the three approaches come to similar major findings but that they suffer from rather different limitations and also provide different perspectives on the subject. In particular, it becomes obvious that agent-based modeling allows us to capture complex organizational structures and provides insights into the processual features of the system under investigation.

show abstract

“…It is the recommended approach for documenting models in the CoMSES Net Computational Model Library (Rollins et al, 2014). However, Müller et al (2014) argue that no single model description standard can completely and throughly characterize a model by itself, suggesting that besides a structured natural language description such as ODD, the availability of a model's source code should be part of a minimum standard for model communication. Furthermore, the ODD protocol does not deal with models from a results or simulation output perspective, which means that an additional section for statistical analysis of results is often required.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It allows modelers to communicate their models using a natural language description within a prescriptive and hierarchical structure, aiding in model design and fostering in-depth model comprehension (Müller et al, 2014). It is the recommended approach for documenting models in the CoMSES Net Computational Model Library (Rollins et al, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As such, it is very easy to inadvertently introduce changes which will alter model dynamics. These type of issues usually derive from a lack of transparency in model descriptions, which constrains how models are assessed and implemented (Müller et al, 2014). Conceptual models should be well specified and adequately described in order to be properly implemented and replicated (Edmonds & Hales, 2003;Wilensky & Rand, 2007).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Towards a standard model for research in agent-based modeling and simulation

Fachada

Lopes

Martins

et al. 2015

PeerJ Computer Science

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Agent-based modeling (ABM) is a bottom-up modeling approach, where each entity of the system being modeled is uniquely represented as an independent decisionmaking agent. ABMs are very sensitive to implementation details. Thus, it is very easy to inadvertently introduce changes which modify model dynamics. Such problems usually arise due to the lack of transparency in model descriptions, which constrains how models are assessed, implemented and replicated. In this paper, we present PPHPC, a model which aims to serve as a standard in agent based modeling research, namely, but not limited to, conceptual model specification, statistical analysis of simulation output, model comparison and parallelization studies. This paper focuses on the first two aspects (conceptual model specification and statistical analysis of simulation output), also providing a canonical implementation of PPHPC. The paper serves as a complete reference to the presented model, and can be used as a tutorial for simulation practitioners who wish to improve the way they communicate their ABMs.

show abstract

Standardised and transparent model descriptions for agent-based models: Current status and prospects

Cited by 81 publications

References 49 publications

Elements of Dynamic Economic Modeling: Presentation and Analysis

Elements of Dynamic Economic Modeling: Presentation and Analysis

Agent-based modeling in managerial science: an illustrative survey and study

Towards a standard model for research in agent-based modeling and simulation

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About