Lecture 6

CE-422 Sustainable Development and Disaster Risk Management

Instructor:
Dr. Shahid Ullah
[email protected]

Earthquake Engineering Center

Department of Civil Engineering, UET Peshawar.
 Course Outline
Week Weekly Lectures CLOs PLOs Remarks
1 Introduction to sustainability the Humanity and environment and its 1 7 To be taught from chapter 1 of the book
state; IPAT Equation; Sustainability Challenges "Sustainability a comprehensive foundation"
Part 1

2 Introduction to sustainability the Humanity and environment and its 1 7 To be taught from chapter 1 of the book
state; IPAT Equation; Sustainability Challenges "Sustainability a comprehensive foundation"
Part 2

3 Development of Public policy; Role of civil engineers in the society; 1 7 Chapter 2 of "Sustainability a comprehensive
Sustainability and Public Policy; Environmental Risk Management foundation"
Part 1 Chapter 1 of "Sustainable Development in
Practice"

4 Development of Public policy; Role of civil engineers in the society; 1 7 Chapter 2 of "Sustainability a comprehensive
Sustainability and Public Policy; Environmental Risk Management foundation"
Part 2 Chapter 1 of "Sustainable Development in
Practice"

5 Definitions; Sustainable Development; Complex engineering Problems. 1 7 Chapter 1 “ The Age of Sustainable
Introduction to the tools and approaches for solving complex problems, Development”
Multi Criteria Decision Making and Analysis Concepts Chapter 1 “Systems approach to management of
disasters”
Chapter 12 “ Sustainable development in
practice”
6 Life Cycle Assessment, Scopes of LCA, Methodology of 1,2 5,7 1. Sustainable development in
LCA, Software for LCA practice
2. The age of sustainable
development
3. Sustainability: a comprehensive
foundation
7 System Thinking, Causal Loop diagrams, Guidelines for 1,2 5,7 1.Business dynamics: system thinking
CLD, Software for system modeling and modeling for complex world.
 Course Outline
Week Weekly Lectures CLOs PLOs Remarks

9 Overview of Disasters; Basic Disasters Concepts and Social 1 7

Contexts of Disasters
10 Hazard, Vulnerability and Risk (Probability and Statistics) 1 7
Concepts
11 A broad understanding of Disaster Risk Management, 1 7
including prevention / preparedness before Disasters and
recovery / reconstruction after Disasters.

12 Disaster Mitigation-Recovery policy and Disaster risk 2 7

management of national level with practical system and
laws

13 Creation of Pakistan emergency management system 2 7

14 Introduction to risk management tools 1 7

15 Flood Risk Management 1 7

16 Earthquake Risk Management 1 7

Final Term Exam 1,2,3 5,7

 Week 6 : Lecture No. 6

SYSTEMS THINKING
Books
 Learning Objectives
The students shall be able to
• Understand systems thinking
• Become aware of available tools used in
systems thinking
• Identify feedback structures in complex
problems
• Draw causal loop diagrams including at least
one feedback loop
 Re-Cap
• Week 4: Triple Bottom Line and Guidelines to
draw causal loop diagrams by Daniel H. Kim
(Systems thinking approach)

• Week 5 : Life cycle assessment (LCA) and

Sustainable Development as complex
engineering problem
 System Thinking
• Systems thinking is an approach to describe the complex
problems.

• System behavior results from the effects of reinforcing and

balancing processes

• It uses variety of diagrams and graphs to model, illustrate,

and predict system behavior e.g., behavior over time (BOT)
graph, which indicates the actions of one or more variables
over a period of time; the causal loop diagram (CLD), which
illustrates the relationships between system elements,
simulations through System Dynamics
Systems thinking is a holistic approach to
analysis that focuses on the way that a
system's constituent parts interrelate and how
systems work over time and within the context
of larger systems.
 Causal Loop Diagrams

• Feedback is a core concept of System Dynamics (SD).

• Our “mental models” often fail to include critical
feedbacks determining the dynamics of our systems.
• CLDs and stock and flow maps are the diagramming
tools used in SD to capture the structure of a system.
(Sterman, 2000)

“Behavior over time (BOT) graph, which indicates the actions of one or
more variables over a period of time”
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• Causal loop diagrams (CLDs) are an
important tool for representing the
feedback structure of systems.

• CLDs are excellent for:

1. Quickly capturing your hypotheses

about the cause of dynamics.

2. Eliciting and capturing the mental

models of individuals or teams.

3. Communicating the important

feedbacks, you believe are responsible
for a problem.
Causal Loop Diagrams
• A causal diagram consists of
variables connected by
arrows denoting the causal
influences among the
variables.

• Variables are related by

causal links, shown by arrows.

• Each causal link is assigned a

polarity, either positive (+) or
negative (-) to indicate how
the dependent variable
changes when the
independent variable
changes.
Causal Loop Diagrams
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• A positive link means that if the cause increases, the
effect increases above what it would otherwise
have been, and if the cause decreases, the effect
decreases below what it would otherwise have
been.

• Please write down in your journals the definition for

the negative link.

• "...................................................................."
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• In the example, an increase in the
average lifetime of the population
means the death rate (in people
per year) will fall below what it
would have been.

• Decrease in the average lifetime

means the death rate will rise
above what it would have been.

• Thus if life expectancy increases,

the number of deaths will fall; and
if life expectancy falls, the death
rate will rise.
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• Link polarities describe the
structure of the system.
• They do not describe the
behavior of the variables.
• Thus they describe what
would happen IF there
were a change.
• They do not describe what
actually happens.
 Causal Loop Dynamics
• An increase in a cause
variable does not
necessarily mean the effect
will actually increase.
• There are two reasons.
• First, a variable often has
more than one input. To
determine what actually
happens you need to know
how all the inputs are
changing.
 Causal Loop Diagram
• When assessing the polarity
of individual links, assume all
other variables are constant
(the famous assumption of
ceteris paribus).

• When assessing the actual

behavior of a system, all
variables interact
simultaneously (all else is
not equal)and computer
simulation is usually needed
to trace out the behavior of
the system and determine
which loops are dominant.
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• Second, and Importantly,
• CLDs do not distinguish between
stocks and flows i .e. the
accumulations of resources in a
system and the rates of change that
alter those resources.

• In example the population is a stock

which accumulates the birth rate less
than the death rate. An increase in
birth rate increase the population
but decrease in birth rate does not
decrease the population.

• Births can only increase the

population they can never reduce it.
 Causal Loop Diagrams
• To know whether a stock is increasing
or decreasing you must know its net
rate of change (in this case, births
less deaths)

• If birth rate rises, population will rise

above what it would have been in the
absence of the change in births, even
if the population continues to fall.
Population will be falling at a slower
rate than it otherwise would.

• Structure and behavior of stocks and

flows is our next target as is
becoming obvious.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Causation Vs Correlation

1. Every link in your diagram 1. Must not include correlations

must represent (What you between variables. Correlations
believe to be) causal among variables reflect the past
relationships between the behavior of a system.
variables.
2. Correlations do not represent the
structure of the system.
2. Your models and causal
diagrams must include only
If circumstances change, if
those relationships you
previously dormant feedback
believe capture the
loops become dominant, if new
underlying causal structure policies are tried, previously
of the system. reliable correlations among
variables may break down.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Causation Vs Correlation

• The Latin root of the word simulate , simulare, means "to

imitate." A system dynamics model must mimic the
structure of the real system well enough that the model
behaves the same way the real system would.

• The Behavior includes not only replicating historical

experience but also responding to circumstances and policies
that are entirely novel.

• Correlations among variables will emerge from the

behavior of the model when you simulate it.
Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Causation Vs Correlation
Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Causation Vs Correlation
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Labeling and Determining Loop Polarities
The Fast Way: Count the Number of The Right Way: Trace the Effect of a
Negative Links
Change around the Loop
• If the number of negative links is even, the
loop is positive; if the number is odd, the • If the feedback effect reinforces the
loop is negative. original change, it is a positive loop;
if it opposes the original change, it
• A single negative link causes the signal to is negative loop. One can start with
reverse: an increase becomes a decrease. any variable in the loop and the
But another negative link reverses the answer shall be the same.
signal again, so the decrease becomes an
increase, reinforcing the original
disturbance. • Assigning loop polarity the right
way rather than the fast way saves
• Fast method always works.......except in a time in the long run.
complex diagram a miscount occurs. Any
mislabel in the diagram.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Naming the Loops
• To help your audience navigate the
network of loops, it's helpful to give
each important feedback a number
and a name.

• Numbering the loops R1, R2, B1, B2,

and so on helps your audience find
each loop as you discuss it.

• Naming the loops helps your audience

understand the function of each loop
and provides useful shorthand for
discussion.

• Labels stand in for a complex set of

causal links.
Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Indicating delays in Causal Links
• Delays are critical in creating
dynamics. Delays give systems
inertia, can create oscillation, and
are often responsible for trade-
offs between the short-and long-
run effects of policies.

• Explicitly portraying the many

delays between a change in price
and the resulting change in
demand makes it easier to see
the worse-before-better behavior
of expenditures on gasoline
caused by a price increase.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Assigning Variable Names
• 1. Variable Names Should
Be Nouns or Noun
Phrases.

• 2. Variable Names Must

Have a Clear Sense of
Direction.

• 3. Choose Variables
Whose Normal Sense of
Direction is Positive.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Tips For Causal Loop Diagrams
1. Use curved lines for information feedbacks. Curved lines help reader
visualize the feedback loops.

2. Make important loops follow circular or oval paths.

3. Organize your diagrams to minimize crossed lines.

4. Don't put circles, hexagons, or other symbols around the variables in

causal diagrams. With exception of showing stocks and flows with
rectangles and valves respectively.

5. Iterate . Since you often won't know what all the variables and loops
will be when you start, you will have to redraw your diagrams, often
many times, to find the best layout.
Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Choose Right Level Of Aggregation
• Causal loop diagrams are designed to
communicate the central feedback
structure of your dynamic hypothesis.

• Plausibility and realism needs to be

maintained.

• If audience doesn't grasp the logic of a

causal link, you should make some of the
intermediate variables more explicit.

• Once you have clarified the logic to the

satisfaction of all, you often can "chunk"
the more detailed representation into a
simple, more aggregate form. The simpler
diagram then serves as a marker for the
richer, underlying causal structure.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Don’t Pull All The Loops in One Large CLD
• Short-term memory can hold 5 or 9 chunks of information at once. this
puts rather sharp limit on the effective size and complexity of a causal
map.

• Resist the temptation to put all the loops you and your clients have
identified into a single comprehensive diagram.

• Build up your model in stages, with a series of smaller causal loop

diagrams. Each diagram should correspond to one part of dynamic
story being told.

• Chunk the diagrams into a simpler, high level overview to show how
they interact with one another.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Make Goals of Negative Loops explicit
• All negative feedback loops have goals.
Goals are the desired state of the
system, and all negative loops function
by comparing the actual state to the
goal, then initiating a corrective action
in response to the discrepancy.

• Making goals explicit encourages people

to ask how the goals are formed. The
goals in most systems are not given
exogenously but are themselves part of
the feedback structure.

• Making goals of negative loops explicit

is important when capturing human
behavior.
 Guidelines for Causal Loop Diagrams
Distinguish B/W Actual & Perceived Conditions

• Often there are significant

differences between the true
state of affairs and the
perception of that state by the
actors in the system.

• There may be delays caused by

reporting and measurement
processes.
•
• There may be noise ,
measurement error, bias, and
distortions.
 Process Point: Developing CLD from an Interview Data

• Much of the data a modeler uses to develop a dynamic

hypothesis comes from interviews and conversations with
people in organizations.

• Semi-structured interviews (where modeler has a set of

predefined questions to ask but is free to depart from the
script to pursue avenues of particular interest) have proven to
be particularly effective.

• The modeler must triangulate by using as many sources of data

as possible to gain insight into the structure of the problem
situation and the decision processes of the actors in it.
 Process Point: Developing CLD from an
Interview Data

• Formulate variable names so that they correspond

closely to the actual words used by the person you
interviewed, while still adhering to the principles for
proper variable name selection described above (noun
phrases, a clear and positive sense of direction). Causal
links should be directly supported by a passage in the
transcript.

• If you are trying to represent a person's mental model,

you must not include any links that cannot be grounded
in the person's own statements.
 Conclusions
Start making arrows in your journal.
They can be random initially but with the passage of time be
sure to revisit this lecture and follow the rules to put your
arrows between two quantities.
Make sure you are working on causal relationships not
correlations.
You are doing Qualitative analysis not quantitative.
What you have learnt today is just system thinking and it’s a
start ………
Next time we meet please come with a story in your journal
with arrows and engineering problems around us.
Thank You
 References
• J. D. Sterman, Systems Thinking and Modeling
for a Complex World, no. December 1999.
2000.
• Systems Thinking In Public Health by Johns
Hopkins University, Online course on Coursera
Supplementary Slides