Improving the decision-making qualities of gaming simulations

Abstract

Gaming simulations (games) for policy and decision making have been the neglected "sibling" of educational and training games. The latter have experienced a widespread usage by practitioners and researchers, while the former have had limited, yet slowly increasing, adoption by organisations. As a result, various issues developing and using these games remain unaddressed. This includes the design of games, their validation, the actual game sessions, and applying the resulting knowledge from games in organisations. In this paper, solutions for issues identified in these four areas of gaming simulations are proposed. Solutions vary from purely analytical to purely social, stressing the interdisciplinary approach required to tackle the issues associated with them. The result consists of several theoretical and practical contributions as well as philosophical considerations regarding games for policy and decision making.

Participatory Simulation Framework for Agent-Based Model Validation in Air Traffic Management

“…Participants are placed in the dynamic environment of the ABM, so that their decision making is intertwined with each other. By joining an agent-based simulation model with human participants, an environment is created, using formal methods [12], where participants make decisions based on underlying rules that are consistent and coherent [4]. Results from the application of participatory simulations in ABM validation have shown qualitative and quantitative agreement between the decision-making of agents and the players [8,1].…”

Technology Adoption in Air Traffic Management: A Combination of Agent-Based Modeling with Behavioral Economics

“…the implementation of policies encouraging new technology adoption in air traffic management (ATM). The next step is the validation of the agent-based model (ABM) through behavioral experiments and participatory simulations (Roungas, Bekius, Meijer, and Verbraeck 2020). The participatory simulations will involve stakeholders from the European ATM industry, who have one-to-one correspondence with the main agents of the ABM.…”

Game elicitation: exploring assistance in delayed-effect supply chain decision making

“…Klabbers [30] thereby proposes the view of the design-in-thesmall for the game and design-in-the-large for the referenced STS. Similarly, Roungas et al [43] refer to the distinction as the game layer (GL) and the simulation layer (SL) while emphasising the advantage of the inclusion of human factors. The game layer entails inherent possibilities to study otherwise unpredictable behaviour of human/organisational actors in a complex system when looking at a combined gaming simulation as human-factors research-site.…”

“…The game layer entails inherent possibilities to study otherwise unpredictable behaviour of human/organisational actors in a complex system when looking at a combined gaming simulation as human-factors research-site. [1,43]. Correspondingly, Duke and Geurts [10] refer to gaming simulation as ".…”