This document discusses modeling individual movement using "social potential" (SP) models. It describes three key aspects to consider: reactive behaviors, cognitive behaviors, and environmental constraints. Reactive behaviors are instinctual reactions to immediate conditions, while cognitive behaviors involve conscious decision making to achieve goals. The environment constrains movement by introducing obstacles. SP models represent these factors using forces that push and pull on individuals. The document provides examples of how SP models can simulate pedestrian movement, traffic, and other scenarios involving groups of moving individuals.
This document discusses modeling individual movement using "social potential" (SP) models. It describes three key aspects to consider: reactive behaviors, cognitive behaviors, and environmental constraints. Reactive behaviors are instinctual reactions to immediate conditions, while cognitive behaviors involve conscious decision making to achieve goals. The environment constrains movement by introducing obstacles. SP models represent these factors using forces that push and pull on individuals. The document provides examples of how SP models can simulate pedestrian movement, traffic, and other scenarios involving groups of moving individuals.
This document discusses modeling individual movement using "social potential" (SP) models. It describes three key aspects to consider: reactive behaviors, cognitive behaviors, and environmental constraints. Reactive behaviors are instinctual reactions to immediate conditions, while cognitive behaviors involve conscious decision making to achieve goals. The environment constrains movement by introducing obstacles. SP models represent these factors using forces that push and pull on individuals. The document provides examples of how SP models can simulate pedestrian movement, traffic, and other scenarios involving groups of moving individuals.
This document discusses modeling individual movement using "social potential" (SP) models. It describes three key aspects to consider: reactive behaviors, cognitive behaviors, and environmental constraints. Reactive behaviors are instinctual reactions to immediate conditions, while cognitive behaviors involve conscious decision making to achieve goals. The environment constrains movement by introducing obstacles. SP models represent these factors using forces that push and pull on individuals. The document provides examples of how SP models can simulate pedestrian movement, traffic, and other scenarios involving groups of moving individuals.
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Journal Title: Social Potential Models for Modeling
Traffic and Transportation
Modeling traffic and transportation requires consideration of how individuals move in a given environment. There are three general aspects to consider when looking at movement: reactive behaviors, cognitive behaviors and constraints due to environmental factors. Individual drivers and pedestrians have a general way of dealing with certain situations, some of which comes from experience and some from personality. In this situation, there is generally only one specific response for any given agent. In other situations, one needs to allow an individual to choose from a set of various possible decisions based on how they affect movement and path planning. A final consideration is how the environment will constrain the general movement of the individual. Much of an individuals movement, especially when driving a vehicle, is reactive. This is due to the fact that most actions are reactions to the conditions of the road and events which are occurring nearby. This is similar to pedestrian movement since walking becomes routine for people. Individuals do not think about every step that they are going to make and every possible outcome, they simply step forward and know the general outcomes they expect. When things deviate from the expected, then their movements are adjusted. Individuals transporting cargo, have a defined origin and destination which requires some decision making such as route planning. There is a goal they are trying to reach, and decisions are made along the way to achieve this goal. We will refer to these as cognitive behaviors, due to the fact that they take some conscious thought to achieve the goal. Techniques of path planning, seeking or organization can be used to represent these choices. The final aspect of movement is the definition of the environment. The individuals need to know where obstacles are and how they interact with them in order to avoid collisions and other unwanted contact. In multi- agent systems there are numerous techniques which can be used to describe how each agent makes decisions and moves, such as Genetic Programming, Reinforced Learning, Case Based Reasoning, Rules Based Reasoning, Game Theory, Neural Network, Context Based Reasoning, Cellular Automata, and SP. The two primary techniques which are used to represent the decisions of individuals in pedestrian simulations are Cellular Automata and SP.This chapter will focus on SP techniques for modeling and how to use it to represent individuals desires and movements during a simulation. A description of the technique is given along with a detailed example of constructing a model from scratch. This will give some insight into the elements of the technique and the process which must be taken to use it effectively. There are a few commonly used models which represent pedestrian movement: Flocking (Reynolds, 1987), HMFV (Helbing, 2002), and LKF (Lakoba, 2005). A brief description of these models will be given along with the forces which are used in the model. Then cognitive behaviors will be discussed which can be added to any of the existing models to create specific desired movements in the individuals. Next, a description of different techniques used to interact with the environment is given. We then conclude by looking at how to apply this technique to more than individuals movements.
Journal (from Simple Example) Simple Example Consider searching for a place to eat when visiting a new location. This would have to be a place where you have never been before therefore you have no previous knowledge of the location of possible places to eat. Now assume that you intend to find a place by wandering around; in this way you will also get to know the area. What factors are going to be important to you? 1. Desire to stay close to the hotel, or where you are staying. 2. Attraction to visible restaurants. 3. Slight repulsion from other individuals. 4. Repulsion from crowded restaurants. These four factors are identified as the causes for the movements of the individual. Assuming that there are no constraints on where you can walk (no walls or buildings) then there is a simple set of rules governing the movement. These rules are built as a set of forces representing the previously
Cognitive behavior forces are forces that can be added to the individual to create specific directional choices. These are things like wandering, seeking, following a path, or following a wall. They are considered cognitive behavioral forces due to the fact that the individual is making a decision using these forces; they are not purely reactive style forces. Wander is sometimes referred to as a random walk. This type of force is generally needed in order to keep an individual from walking in a perfectly straight line. Basically it creates small deviations from the path the individual would otherwise take (Reynolds, 1999). One method of applying this technique is to choose a small maximum angle (q max) of deviation inside of which one would place an artificial attraction point and then add the force from the attraction point to the other forces acting on the individual (Figure 1). The strength of the force can be adjusted by choosing the distance (d) the artificial attraction point is placed from the center of the individual.
The environment is a collection of geometric objects the individual must interact with, usually by avoiding them. The following are obstacles found in the simulation that define the environment in which individuals must maneuver. Obstacles An obstacle should have an external shape described in some manner such that the distance to points on it can be found. Also, obstacles should have a center. It is best to keep the definition of the obstacles to simple structures like rectangles and circles. Using pixilation principles defined for computer graphics, it is reasonably easy to represent all possible shapes by these two primitive structures (Pineda, 1988).
SP techniques are very useful in describing the movements of individuals. The procedures described have been used to implement various models and to look at how individuals might be expected to react to given environments. However, it can easily be expanded and applied to individuals driving a car, riding a bicycle, etc. Recently Majid Ali Khan, Damla Turgut and Ladislau Blni (Khan 2008) have demonstrated the use of the SP technique for simulating trucks driving in highway convoys. The mathematics of the models presented has been condensed, where needed, to allow for simpler implementations and easier understanding of the process of the SP techniques. These simplifications allowed relationships between interactions with obstacles and with other individuals to be apparent and quickly defined. Anytime individuals are in control of their movement and need to make decisions while simultaneously being constrained by the environment, SP models can be constructed to represent how individuals would tend to move. Environments representing exiting rooms, walking in hallways, exiting gated areas, and wandering in a room have been visualized and simulated using this technique. By adding new parameters to existing models, ages and certain social characteristics were represented (Jaganthan, 2007; Kaup, 2006; Kaup, 2007). This has allowed the exploration of how environmental changes can affect different types of individuals. Differing exit strategies have been studied to see if environmental factors can be used to increase the efficiency of an exit. All of these results demonstrate the usefulness and applicability of the procedures described for the SP technique. It also provides the possibility of eventually testing and validating social interaction theories. Given any theory, one could directly model that theory by programming a simulation so that the agents would respond per that theory. Then by running the simulation, one could observe what social structure(s) would arise.