An uncertainty quantification framework for agent-based modeling and simulation in networked anagram games

ABSTRACT

In a networked anagram game, players are provided letters with possible actions of requesting letters from their neighbours, replying to letter requests, or forming words. The objective is to form as many words as possible as a team. The experimental data show that behaviours among players can vary significantly. However, simulations using agent-based models (ABM) in the literature often have not incorporated proper uncertainty quantification methods to characterise diverse behaviours of players. In this work, we propose an uncertainty quantification framework to build, exercise, and evaluate agent behaviour models and simulations for networked group anagram games. Specifically, using the data of game experiments, the proposed framework considers the clustering of game players based on their performance to reflect players’ heterogeneity. Moreover, we also quantify uncertainty within each cluster through statistical modelling and inference. Numerical studies of networked game configurations are conducted to demonstrate the merits of the proposed framework.

KEYWORDS:

• Uncertainty quantification
• agent-based models
• model construction
• simulation
• networked group anagram games

Acknowledgments

We thank the editor, associate editor, and anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments for improving this manuscript. Research Computing at The University of Virginia for providing computational resources and technical support. This work has been partially supported by NSF CRISP 2.0 (CMMI Grant 1916670) and NSF CISE Expeditions (CCF-1918770).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation [CRISP 2.0 (CMMI Grant 1916670)]; National Science Foundation [CISE Expeditions (CCF-1918770)].