Empirical Test of a Psychologically Based Simulation
of Collective Action
Robert Tobias
rtobias@sozpsy.unizh.ch
The problem of organizing collective action campaigns
is tackled with a multiagent simulation, in which the actor‚s decision to
participate is modeled on the basis of an expansion of the social psychological
Theory of Planned Behavior. The variables entering into the model of the
individual‚s
decision to participate are attitude, return, subjective social norm, and
perceived behavioral control. With these four variables, various social scientific
theories get integrated (Elaboration Likelihood Model, Theory of Planned
Behavior, Rational Choice Theory). The theories allow conceptualization of
interactions among individuals and the effect of activators, seeking to recruit
others to participate in a collective action can be studied. Simulations
of a population of 10,000 different agents revealed the influence of several
factors, though, only one or two examples can be shown in the presentation.
The focus of the presentation will be on the empirical
test of this computer model using data that was gathered during a collective
action campaign in a Swiss community. Based on this data, the behavior (participation
or non-participation) of each individual in the sample was calculated and
the simulation results compared with the real behavior. In more than 85%
of the cases, the calculated behavior equals the empirical data.
In a second step, the sample data was extrapolated to
simulate the entire community. The simulated diffusion of participation appeared
to be similar to the real dynamics of the collective action campaign in the
community. Thus, the model could be used to evaluate the organization of
the collective action campaign.
Though the model has to be developed further in many
regards, a lot of important aspects for planning collective action campaigns
can already be investigated adequately with it.