CAREER: The Role of Advanced Simulation Technologies in Innovation Processes

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This set of studies will examine the role of advanced, computer-based simulations in managerial and policy-making decisions by comparing the work of scientists, engineers, managers and policymakers in three different disciplines: automotive engineering, atmospheric research, and urban planning. Research suggests that if the outputs of computer simulations appear to have high visual fidelity with the physical systems they represent, lay users are likely to believe that simulations make accurate predictions. This project will examine the use of simulation-based evidence by both technical and non-technical users during the search, generation and persuasion phases of decisions. The project will employ ethnographic methods to identify and assess representations and understandings of simulation products, patterns in acceptance and use, and associated changes in organizations' formal and informal influence structures. The results from these studies will give managers and policy makers insight into the consequences that new simulation technologies have for decision-making and, by association, decision-related organizational structures. By improving our understanding of how simulation models become persuasive communication devices, the results of this study will also provide policymakers with the appropriate questions to ask to determine the assumptions underlying simulation models and will give them a more general understanding of when and how simulations can be misleading or helpful.