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While we looked at several models to explore social patterns and randomness, there were two that were much more pertinent than the others.

In the case of the ant colony, it was established that ants, without any director, maintain an equilibrium among the three jobs in an ant colony. At all times, ant were striving to reach a balance of 50% to 25% and 25%.This was discovered by removing certain groups from the colony and observing that the remaining ants immediately compensate for the missing ants to maintain a balance of 50/25/25. It was noted that when hydrocarbons are introduced into the colony, ants perceived them as other ants and, thus, did not maintain equilibrium. Through this experiment, it is observed that ants have an inherent social awareness which drives them to establish certain work/social patterns that are larger than their understanding.

In contrast to the very prescribed, organized practice of worker organization in an ant colony, the case of the AIDS experiment previewed human's use of personal and individual choices to guide social patterns continue or stop the spread of AIDS. We observed that several aspects had varying outcomes on the number of "participants" who contracted and eventually spread AIDS to others. The measurable/controllable aspects were:

Coupling Tendency (out of 10), Average Condom Use (out of 10), n or number of participants in the dating pool, Average Commitment (in weeks),  and the Frequency of HIV testing. We found the following:

The more people, the faster the spread

The less condom use, the faster the spread

The higher the incidence of coupling, the faster the spread

The lower the average commitment, the faster the spread

The more frequent the testing, the slower the rate of spread

The less frequent/more realistic the testing, the faster the spread

Test situation: reality-based- given a small collegiate social environment

Coupling Tendency= 7

Avg. commitment= 4 weeks

Condom Use= 3

Testing= .35

100% HIV infected in less than 250 weeks

Why are our findings not 100% accurate? The problem with using computer technology to simulate social patterns is that free choice cannot be accounted for and complete generalizability cannot be achieved. Though love and attraction are a result of chemical/molecular reactions, sexual interaction can in no way be predicted.

Anna Chiles, Jen Pierre, Maria Miranda