Author Profile

Roderick MacDonald

http://www.isdps.org

Affiliation: Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy, University at Albany, State University of New York, Albany, New York, USA

Rod MacDonald is the director of the Initiative for System Dynamics in the Public Sector located at Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy at the University at Albany. He earned his Ph.D. in Public Administration and Policy from the University at Albany’s Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy where he specialized in the development of computer simulation models as decision support tools. He has used the tools and techniques of system dynamics computer simulation modeling to analyze deposit insurance issues for the banking industry and to address problems in the delivery of mental health services, fleet maintenance, supply chain management, Social Security disability benefits, DWI recidivism, the flow criminals through the criminal justice system, HIV/AIDS, and traffic safety issues. He also started and ran MindWalk Consulting for seven years prior to becoming the director the Initiative for System Dynamics in the Public Sector. Prior to starting MindWalk Consulting Mr. MacDonald administered a famine relief program in Botswana, Africa (1985-1988), has developed low income housing projects in New York State’s Capital Region (1988-1991), and provided technical assistance on management issues to nonprofits in New York State (1991-1993).

Recent Posts

The Ebola Crisis and the Corresponding Public Behavior: A System Dynamics Approach

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Background: The interaction of several sociocultural and environmental factors during an epidemic crisis leads to behavioral responses that consequently make the crisis control a complex problem.

Methods: The system dynamics approach has been adopted to study the relationships between spread of disease, public attention, situational awareness, and community’s response to the Ebola epidemic.

Results: In developing different simulation models to capture the trend of death and incidence data from the World Health Organization for the Ebola outbreak, the final model has the best fit to the historical trends. Results demonstrate that the increase of quarantining rate over time due to increase in situational awareness and performing safe burials had a significant impact on the control of epidemic. However, public attention did not play a significant role.

Conclusion: The best fit to historical data are achieved when behavioral factors specific to West Africa like studying the Situational Awareness and Public Attention are included in the model. However, by ignoring the sociocultural factors, the model is not able to represent the reality; therefore, in the case of any epidemics, it is necessary that all the parties and community members find the most significant behavioral factors that can curb the epidemic.