EcoSphere: A new paradigm for problem solving in complex systems

Abstract

The western perspective on the environment has changed in the last decades. Many natural processes, such as hurricanes or tsunamis, and cultural ones, such as nuclear power plants or space missions, hold immense potential to cause problems, so the current state of the world is often seen as a complex system. Dealing with complex systems, particularly unstable ones with autonomously changing (eigendynamic) elements, will be one of the key competences for future generations, which is why measuring and training these competences is so important today. This chapter focuses on measuring competency at problem solving in complex systems (PSCS). It introduces the processes involved in human problem solving – from observation, whether through instruction or active construction, to exploration and finally regulation, and discusses their relations to the environment, which is built up of complex systems. It then presents the new assessment tool EcoSphere, which is a simulation framework for testing and training human behaviour in complex systems. In particular, it allows test takers’ previous knowledge to be taken into account to better measure their problem-solving abilities.