Dynamically Integrating Macro and Micro Processes

动态集成宏观和微观流程

• 批准号: 7650409
• 负责人: BARBARA ENTWISLE
• 金额: $ 27.64万
• 依托单位: UNIV OF NORTH CAROLINA CHAPEL HILL
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-09-30 至 2011-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/7650409
• 关键词: Accounting; Affect; Behavior; Cells; Characteristics; Communities; Complement; Complex; Data; Dimensions; Discipline; Economic Conditions; Economics; Elements; Ethics; Geography; Glass; Health; Household; Individual; Infant Mortality; Learning; Link; Literature; Marriage; Measures; Meteorology; Methodology; Methods; Modeling; Nature; Outcome; Process; Randomized; Research; Research Personnel; Running; Social Network; Sociology; Spouses; Statistical Models; Structure; System; Techniques; Testing; Thailand; Time; Ursidae Family; base; computerized tools; falls; improved; innovation; insight; land use; migration; research study; social; social model; theories; tool; web site

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Many aspects of the social world bear on important health outcomes, but for most, the exact nature of their impact is still unclear. Although much has been learned through statistical approaches, the literature falls short of a causal understanding of how macro and micro processes interrelate in affecting health. The proposed research uses a spatially explicit agent-based modeling approach, informed by insights from sociology, geography, and economics. Dynamic social networks are included endogenously, an especially innovative element. Through the construction of a model in one setting, a set of modeling tools will be developed that will be applicable across a wide range of settings. These new tools will be made available through a public website. Once the agent-based model is constructed, it will be used to study interconnections among the social, spatial, and biophysical dimensions of the local context, taking into account migration, residential choice, land use, and household wealth, and feedbacks therein. In the process will come a better understanding of the consequences of oversimplification in standard statistical models of community effects. The model will also be used to conduct experiments about the effects of a sudden shift in infant mortality and shifts in economic conditions. The model will be field tested twice, the first time to validate key model assumptions and the second time to explore unexpected results. Indeed, an advantage of the agent-based approach is the possibility of "emergence" at the system or community level (i.e., the integration of macro and micro processes producing new structures not anticipated based on a simple aggregation of individual and household behaviors). Finally, borrowing and extending tools from the fields of meteorology and control theory, new methods for testing model sensitivity that are more computationally efficient than those now in use will be developed, applied, and made broadly available. The proposed project will develop tools to study social processes involving individuals, households, social networks, and communities in relation to health. The application of these tools will help us better understand and interpret the research literature connecting community factors with health outcomes and provide a complement to the standard statistical approaches.

描述（由申请人提供）：社会的许多方面都与重要的健康结果有关，但对于大多数人来说，其影响的确切性质仍不清楚。尽管通过统计方法已经了解了很多知识，但文献缺乏对宏观和微观过程如何相互影响健康的因果关系的理解。拟议的研究采用了基于代理的空间明确建模方法，并借鉴了社会学、地理学和经济学的见解。动态社交网络是内生的，这是一个特别创新的元素。通过在一个环境中构建模型，将开发一套适用于各种环境的建模工具。这些新工具将通过公共网站提供。一旦构建了基于主体的模型，它将用于研究当地环境的社会、空间和生物物理维度之间的相互联系，同时考虑到移民、居住选择、土地使用和家庭财富以及其中的反馈。在此过程中，我们将更好地理解社区效应标准统计模型过于简单化的后果。该模型还将用于进行关于婴儿死亡率突然变化和经济条件变化的影响的实验。该模型将进行两次现场测试，第一次是为了验证关键模型假设，第二次是为了探索意想不到的结果。事实上，基于主体的方法的一个优点是在系统或社区层面“出现”的可能性（即，宏观和微观过程的整合产生新的结构，而不是基于个人和家庭行为的简单聚合来预期）。最后，借用和扩展气象学和控制理论领域的工具，将开发、应用并广泛使用用于测试模型灵敏度的新方法，这些方法比现在使用的方法计算效率更高。拟议的项目将开发工具来研究涉及个人、家庭、社交网络和社区与健康相关的社会过程。这些工具的应用将帮助我们更好地理解和解释将社区因素与健康结果联系起来的研究文献，并为标准统计方法提供补充。