Proyecto de «Generación de Conocimiento», Agencia Estatal de Investigación. October 2023 – August 2026.
The project Stochastic Methods And Citizen science practices in the study of social CompleX Systems (SMACXS) implements citizen science practices to the study of social complex systems and combines them with sophisticated stochastic methods. How can we adopt participatory and inclusive practices to the study of social complex systems? And, furthermore, which stochastic methods and models shall be then considered and how?
Figure from: Larroya, F.. Sci Data 10, 428 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-023-02328-3
Complex systems are systems with emergent properties that could not be easily predicted based on the precise knowledge of its constituent parts or their mutual interactions. This is the case of many physical systems where the collective macroscopic properties are the result of wide-scale, nonlinear coupling between atoms or molecules that reinforce or attenuate the response of the system to endogenous or exogenous changes. These distinctive traits can be associated to many social episodes. The usual way in which Physics tackle problems like those mentioned is by means of an extensive and accurate treatment of statistical properties. But, as physicists, we also want to give reason of these features.
The project wants to run non-oriented research, and therefore we want to set new methods and models able to contribute to the study of social complex systems. We are especially interested in describing the time evolution of key magnitudes or the interdependences among the different elements of a social phenomenon.
Given our background, we will focus on the development of new stochastic methods and models and offer powerful tools to characterize and parameterize the observed social phenomena attributes. However, this coarse-grained description will not suffice in some cases. Given that social systems might be the result of the interaction of many conscious and heterogeneous agents that follow adaptable behavioural rules based on selfish and altruistic competing interests, we will also develop computational agent-based models.
Although this is a non-oriented research project, we will focus primarily on three topics, socio-economic inequities, urban sustainability, and new forms of education, giving us however time to explore other social complex systems. The above three topics are key topics in the Horizon Europe research program, and they are explicitly mentioned in the United Nations Sustainable and Development Goals (SDGs) as major societal challenges. Both the Horizon program and SDGs are instrumental in the current State Plan for Scientific and Technical Research and Innovation 2021-2023 which recognizes the need to eliminate the barriers between scientists and non-scientists and the public and private spheres as well as increasing the capacity for diffusion and communication of R+D and to society. Likewise, the Spanish Science and Technology and Innovation Strategy 2021-2027 specifically mentions citizen science among its four basic principles of support for national research and innovation. This is the reason why we have also decided to introduce citizen science practice to the study of social complex systems.
Credits
Project PID2022-140757NB-I00 funded by MICIU/AEI /10.13039/501100011033 /10.13039/501100011033 and by FEDER, UE.
