Community-based System Dynamics Research Articles

Dynamics of sustained use and abandonment of clean cooking systems: lessons from rural India

Clean cooking technologies—ranging from efficient cookstoves to clean fuels—are widely deployed to reduce household air pollution and alleviate adverse health and climate consequences. Although much progress has been made on the technical aspects, sustained and proper use of clean cooking technologies by populations with the most need has been problematic. Only by understanding how clean cooking as an intervention is embedded within complex community processes can we ensure its sustained implementation. Using a community-based system dynamics approach, we engaged two rural communities in co-creating a dynamic model to explain the processes influencing the uptake and transition to sustained use of biogas (an anaerobic methane digester), a clean fuel and cooking technology. The two communities provided contrasting cases: one abandoned biogas while the other continues to use it. We present a system dynamics simulation model, associated analyses, and experiments to understand what factors drive transition and sustained use. A central insight of the model is community processes influencing the capacity to solve technical issues. Model analysis shows that families begin to abandon the technology when it takes longer to solve problems. The momentum in the community then shifts from a determination to address issues with the cooking technology toward caution in further adhering to it. We also conducted experiments using the simulation model to understand the impact of interventions aimed at renewing the use of biogas. A combination of theoretical interventions, including repair of non-functioning biogas units and provision of embedded technical support in communities, resulted in a scenario where the community can continue using the technology even after support is retracted. Our study also demonstrates the utility of a systems approach for engaging local stakeholders in delineating complex community processes to derive significant insights into the dynamic feedback mechanisms involved in the sustained use of biogas by the poor.

Moving alcohol prevention research forward-Part II: new directions grounded in community-based system dynamics modeling.

Given the complexity of factors contributing to alcohol misuse, appropriate epistemologies and methodologies are needed to understand and intervene meaningfully. We aimed to (1) provide an overview of computational modeling methodologies, with an emphasis on system dynamics modeling; (2) explain how community-based system dynamics modeling can forge new directions in alcohol prevention research; and (3) present a primer on how to build alcohol misuse simulation models using system dynamics modeling, with an emphasis on stakeholder involvement, data sources and model validation. Throughout, we use alcohol misuse among college students in the United States as a heuristic example for demonstrating these methodologies. System dynamics modeling employs a top-down aggregate approach to understanding dynamically complex problems. Its three foundational properties-stocks, flows and feedbacks-capture non-linearity, time-delayed effects and other system characteristics. As a methodological choice, system dynamics modeling is amenable to participatory approaches; in particular, community-based system dynamics modeling has been used to build impactful models for addressing dynamically complex problems. The process of community-based system dynamics modeling consists of numerous stages: (1) creating model boundary charts, behavior-over-time-graphs and preliminary system dynamics models using group model-building techniques; (2) model formulation; (3) model calibration; (4) model testing and validation; and (5) model simulation using learning-laboratory techniques. Community-based system dynamics modeling can provide powerful tools for policy and intervention decisions that can result ultimately in sustainable changes in research and action in alcohol misuse prevention.

Community based system dynamic as an approach for understanding and acting on messy problems: a case study for global mental health intervention in Afghanistan.

BackgroundAfghanistan lacks suitable specialized mental healthcare services despite high prevalence of severe mental health disorders which are aggravated by the conflict and numerous daily stressors. Recent studies have shown that Afghans with mental illness are not only deprived of care but are vulnerable in many other ways. Innovative participatory approaches to the design of mental healthcare policies and programs are needed in such challenging context.MethodsWe employed community based system dynamics to examine interactions between multiple factors and actors to examine the problem of persistently low service utilization for people with mental illness. Group model building sessions, designed based on a series of scripts and led by three facilitators, took place with NGO staff members in Mazar-I-Sharif in July 2014 and in Kabul in February 2015.ResultsWe identified major feedback loops that constitute a hypothesis of how system components interact to generate a persistently low rate of service utilization by people with mental illness. In particular, we found that the interaction of the combined burdens of poverty and cost of treatment interact with cultural and social stigmatizing beliefs, in the context of limited clinical or other treatment support, to perpetuate low access to care for people with mental disorders. These findings indicate that the introduction of mental healthcare services alone will not be sufficient to meaningfully improve the condition of individuals with mental illness if community stigma and poverty are not addressed concurrently.ConclusionsOur model highlights important factors that prevent persons with mental illness from accessing services. Our study demonstrates that group model building methods using community based system dynamics can provide an effective tool to elicit a common vision on a complex problem and identify shared potential strategies for intervention in a development and global health context. Its strength and originality is the leadership role played by the actors embedded within the system in describing the complex problem and suggesting interventions.

Engaging Communities: Necessary but Not Sufficient for Community-Based System Dynamics

Engaging Communities: Necessary but Not Sufficient for Community-Based System Dynamics