TABLE 1.

Glossary of systems science concepts

Adaptive capacity: capacity to adjust its own characteristics or behaviors to respond to existing and future conditions and Problems.11

Agent-based model: quantitative modeling technique that simulates a composition of autonomous entities (e.g., persons or organizations), called agents, that “make decisions” according to a set of behavioral rules that guide their interaction with the surrounding environment and other agents over time, shaping the system’s global patterns.12

Complex adaptive system: system formed by many components that are irreducibly entwined, interacting over time with no or minimal central coordination or control, creating collective patterns and ways of functioning that are not displayed by the individual components and that adapt in response to changes in the context the system exists.6

Feedback loop: cause-and-effect chain that connects two or more factors in a circuit (or loop). Feedback loops can be positive (factors reinforce each other over time) or negative (factors balance each other over time).13

Group model building: participatory method for involving people in a modeling process.14

Just-in-time adaptive Intervention: intervention design that adapts its properties (e.g., the type, timing, intensity) as conditions and contexts change, delivering support at the moment and in the context that it is most needed or is most likely to be receptive.15

Network analysis: set of methods and techniques to describe and analyze networks, i.e., structures of relations or connections among entities (e.g., people, organizations, projects).16

Self-organization: process through which a system’s global structure arise solely from local interactions among the elements of the system, with no or minimal central coordination or control.6

System-based solution: processes and actions to deal with a problem that are underpinned by systems thinking and systems science principles and methods.

System dynamics model: quantitative modeling technique that uses coupled differential or integral equations to describe and analyze the global behavior of complex systems over time. These equations represent the factors and quantities involved in the systems and how they affect each other over time.13

Systems science: interdisciplinary field engaged in the study of the properties of systems.6

Systems thinking: way of thinking, conceptualize, and make sense of the world characterized by the application of core systems concepts (e.g., inter-relationships, feedback loops, adaptation, self-organization).17