System Dynamics
First published: 2013
Brief summary
MIT OCW course introducing feedback loops and system dynamics modelling.
Article
System dynamics is a modelling method for analysing how accumulations, flows, delays and feedback loops shape behaviour over time. It is commonly applied to organisations, public policy, environmental management and other systems with interacting processes.
Stocks represent quantities that accumulate, while flows increase or decrease those stocks. Feedback loops connect variables so that changes can reinforce further change or counteract it, and time delays can cause overshoot, oscillation or slow adjustment.
Causal-loop diagrams provide qualitative maps of proposed relationships. Stock-and-flow models convert those relationships into equations that can be simulated under specified assumptions and parameter values.
The MIT course applies these tools to strategy, organisational change and policy design. Simulation allows alternative explanations and interventions to be tested, but results depend on model boundaries, data quality, parameter estimates and the validity of the assumed causal structure.
Source details and credits
- Source / publisher: MIT OCW
- Source type: Course material
- URL type: WWW
- Credits: MIT OCW
- URL: https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/15-871-introduction-to-system-dynamics-fall-2013/