This is an introduction to the special section of JASSS on the above topic. It argues for the importance of qualitative evidence in social science, and particularly in the specification of agent-based models. It ends by suggesting some criteria for judging methods for using qualitative evidence...

A structure for analysing narrative data is suggested, one that distinguishes three parts in sequence: context (a heuristic to identify what knowledge is relevant given a kind of situation), scope (what is possible within that situation) and narrative elements (the detailed conditional and...

There are considerable difficulties in the way of the development of useful and reliable simulation models of social phenomena, including that any simulation necessarily includes many assumptions that are not directly supported by evidence. Despite these difficulties, many still hope to develop...

Science is the result of a substantially social process. That is, science relies on many inter-personal processes, including: selection and communication of research findings, discussion of method, checking and judgement of others' research, development of norms of scientific behaviour,...

Brian Arthur's `El Farol Bar' model is extended so that the agents also learn and communicate. The learning and communication is implemented using an evolutionary process acting upon a population of mental models inside each agent. The evolutionary process is based on a Genetic Programming...

An investigation into the conditions conducive to the emergence of heterogeneity amoung agents is presented. This is done by using a model of creative artificial agents to investigate some of the possibilities. The simulation is based on Brian Arthurs `El Farol Bar model but extended so that the...

We present a computational simulation which captures aspects of negotiation as the interaction of agents searching for an agreement over their own mental model. Specifically this simulation relates the beliefs of each agent about the action of cause and effect to the resulting negotiation...