Developing a Crowd Model for Military Simulation

Presenter

Mikel D. Petty, Ph.D.

Chief Scientist

Virginia Modeling, Analysis and Simulation Center

Old Dominion University

Abstract

Crowds of non-combatants play a large and increasingly recognized role
in modern military operations, and often create substantial difficulties
for the combatant forces involved.  U. S. military actions in Mogadishu,
Bosnia, and Iraq exemplify the significant effects crowds may have on
military operations.  However, in spite of their potential significance,
realistic models of crowds are essentially absent from current military
simulations.  For the scenarios considered likely in future conflicts
the absence of crowds and of non-combatants in general would be a serious
departure from realism.

VMASC is engaged in a two-phase research project aimed at developing
a crowd modeling capability for military simulation.  The first phase,
recently completed, consisted of three parts:  a requirements analysis
to identify military simulation crowd modeling requirements, a literature
survey to examine psychological research relevant to crowd modeling, and
a design study to explore design issues in the implementation of a crowd
simulation.  In the second phase, now well underway, we are developing
a crowd simulation, implemented as a distributed simulation federate,
that will be interoperable with existing military simulations and will
have a credible psychological basis for the crowd behavior it generates.

This presentation describes the crowd modeling project.  First, the
results of the first phase are summarized.  Then the current status of
the project is explained, including the process being employed to acquire
direct information regarding the behavior of crowds, the design and
implementation of the crowd federate, and the concept and development
of historically accurate reference scenarios for use in validation
and experimentation.  Technical and modeling challenges (e.g., suitable
computational psychological models) encountered so far will be identified
and discussed.  Finally, the future plans for the project are laid out,
including two experiments planned to test the crowd federate; the first
will examine the level of crowd behavior fidelity needed and the second
will test the architectural reconfigurability of the crowd federate.

Biography

Mikel D. Petty is Chief Scientist of the Virginia Modeling, Analysis and
Simulation Center at Old Dominion University.  He received a Ph.D. in
Computer Science from the University of Central Florida in 1997.
Dr. Petty has worked in modeling and simulation research and development
since 1990 in areas that include simulation interoperability, computer
generated forces, multi-resolution simulation, and applications of theory
to simulation. He has published over 90 research papers and has been
awarded over 30 research contracts.  He has served on a National Research
Council committee on modeling and simulation and is currently an editor
of the journals SIMULATION:  Transactions of the Society for Modeling and
Simulation International and Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation.