Article

CMFDM: A methodology to guide the design of a conceptual model of farmers' decision-making processes

Marion Robert, Jérôme Dury, Alban Thomas, Olivier Therond, Muddu Sekhar, Shrinivas Badiger, Laurent Ruiz et Jacques Eric Bergez

Résumé

The agricultural research community offers languages and approaches to model farmers' decision-making processes but does not often clearly detail the steps necessary to build an agent model underlying farmers' decision-making processes. We propose an original and readily applicable methodology for modelers to guide data acquisition and analysis, incorporate expert knowledge, and conceptualize decision-making processes in farming systems using a software engineering language to support the development of the model. We propose a step-by-step approach that combines decision-making analysis with a modeling approach inspired by cognitive sciences and software-development methods. The methodology starts with case-based analysis to study and determine the complexity of decision-making processes and provide tools to obtain a generic and conceptual model of the decisional agent in the studied farming system. A generic farm representation and decision diagrams are obtained from cross-case analysis and are modeled with Unified Modeling Language. We applied the methodology to a research question on water management in an emerging country (India). Our methodology bridges the gap between field observations and the design of the decision model. It is a useful tool to guide modelers in building decision model in farming system.

Mots-clés

Decision modeling; Farming systems; Water management; Case-based analysis; Cognitive task analysis; UML;

Référence

Marion Robert, Jérôme Dury, Alban Thomas, Olivier Therond, Muddu Sekhar, Shrinivas Badiger, Laurent Ruiz et Jacques Eric Bergez, « CMFDM: A methodology to guide the design of a conceptual model of farmers' decision-making processes », Agricultural Systems, vol. 148, octobre 2016, p. 86–94.

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Publié dans

Agricultural Systems, vol. 148, octobre 2016, p. 86–94