Agent-Based Models of the Green Dot Bystander Violence Prevention Program on College Campuses

Despite the hard work of a diverse collection of organizations committed to violence prevention, the prevalence of rape, abuse, and other forms of interpersonal violence remains startling, especially on college campuses.Here we present an agent-based model (ABM) of interpersonal violence rooted in the philosophy of the Green Dot Bystander Training Program, in the hopes of providing insight into ways in which training of students can be improved so that intervention attempts are more effective.Two models, with and without adaptive behaviors, are studied under two population sizes.Through sensitivity testing, various outcomes are analyzed to measure the effectiveness of each intervention strategy.The scenarios that result in the smallest relative number of violent acts are those with a denser population, while the adaptive models produce unexpected results that prompt questions about human behavior and our tendency toward bystander intervention.