An agent based model for networking of scholars Saradhi Motamarri a , N.D.L. Liyanage b, ⁎ , Rosemary Smart c a School of Information Systems, ASB, University of New South Wales, Australia b Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, University of Sydney, Australia c School of Built Environment, University of New South Wales, Australia article info Article history: Available online 13 February 2014 Keywords: NASC model Collaboration Links Academic relationships NetLogo abstract It is a common phenomenon that at any gathering, people cluster into small and multiple groups to: chat, exchange ideas, establish relations, and explore collaborative opportunities either within their field of work or even in newer frontiers. Certain relationships remain strong and may eventually lead to fruitful collaborations while others may be short lived. Depiction and/or modelling of such an emergent social networking behaviours are inherently complex. With this motivation, in the context of an academic con- ference, this research focuses on the development of ‘Networking of Scholars at an Academic Conference (NASC) Model’ using Agent Based Modelling and Simulation (ABMS) technique. The paper describes the model and its implementation in NetLogo. NetLogo is powerful programming environment that facili- tates the generation of scenarios and thus helps visualisation of emergent network of relationships among scholars. Ó 2014 Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 摘 要 常见的现象是任何聚集在一起的人群, 这些人组成几个小群体, 在他们的专业领域, 有时甚至在某些前沿学科, 畅 谈、交换意见、建立关系、以及探讨合作机会。某些关系保持密切并可能最终导致成果丰富的合作关系, 而某 些关系则是短命的。对这些初步的社交网络行为的论述和/或模型制作天生就是复杂的。带着这个动机, 在学术 会议上, 本研究关注的是‘‘学者在学术会议上的社交网络”模型的发展, 采用的是基于主体建模和模拟技术。本文 论述该模型及其在NetLogo内的实施。NetLogo是一种强有力的编程环境, 促进场景的生成, 有助于学者中新出 现的关系网的视觉效果。 Ó 2014 Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Academic conferences assure lively forum for scholars for pre- senting their professional work as papers and posters, intellectual exchanges and debates of their researches, gain knowledge by attending workshops and field trips. In addition to that conferences provide opportunities to join with other scholars to develop cul- tural, social and scholarly market places for professional develop- ments and collaborative work (Friedkin, 1984; Liberman and Wolf, 1997). In the broader sense, conferences encourage network- ing among participants could they be new connections, meeting old contacts and/or avenues build long-term relationships. Since a conference is a middle ground, acts as an intermediary among academic faculty, research students, industry practitioners, researchers, industry/product promotional marketers and sales people. Due to the fact of the respective professional boundaries and opportunities present, the knowledge, interests and experi- ence level of the participants may vary, for example from a profes- sor to sales person. Therefore, when these differing groups of people come in contact with each other during the conference, their interactions will not only be driven by their personal behav- iours but also their professional attitudes and interests. Thus a study of networking behaviour of scholars is interesting, but chal- lenging due to the complicated and dynamic nature of participants. 2. Research context The online dictionaries define an academic conference as a con- ference for researchers (not necessarily academics) to present and discuss their work. Together with academic or scientific journals, conferences provide an important channel for exchange of infor- mation between researchers. The mutual relationships that form among the conference participants at can actually facilitate a 1441-3582/$ - see front matter Ó 2014 Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ausmj.2013.12.009 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: msaradhi@yahoo.com (S. Motamarri), nirmala.liyanage@ sydney.edu.au (N.D.L. Liyanage), rosemary.smart@unsw.edu.au (R. Smart). Australasian Marketing Journal 22 (2014) 54–59 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Australasian Marketing Journal journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/amj