Agile design meets hybrid models: Using modularity to enhance hybrid model design and use

Dynamic modeling offers many benefits to understand the dynamics of complex systems. Hybrid modeling attempts to bring together the complementary benefits of differing dynamic modeling approaches, such as System Dynamics and Agent-based modeling, to bear on a single research question. We present here, by means of an example, a hybrid modeling technique that allows different modules to be specified separately from their implementation. This enables each module to be designed and constructed on an ad-hoc basis. This approach results in 3 benefits: it facilitates incremental development, a key focus in agile software design; it enhances the ability to test and learn from the behavior of a dynamic model; and it can help with clearer thinking about model structure, especially for those of a hybrid nature.