Abstract
In this thesis we present our work, where we developed artificial societies of
intelligent agents, in order to understand and simulate adaptive behaviour and social
processes. We obtain this in three parallel ways: First, we present a behaviours
production system capable of reproducing a high number of properties of adaptive
behaviour and of exhibiting emergent lower cognition. Second, we introduce a simple
model for social action, obtaining emergent complex social processes from simple
interactions of imitation and induction of behaviours in agents. And third, we
present our approximation to a behaviours virtual laboratory, integrating our
behaviours production system and our social action model in animats. In our
behaviours virtual laboratory, the user can perform a wide variety of experiments,
allowing him or her to test the properties of our behaviours production system and
our social action model, and also to understand adaptive and social behaviour. It
can be accessed and downloaded through the Internet. Before presenting our
proposals, we make an introduction to artificial intelligence and behaviour-based
systems, and also we give notions of complex systems and artificial societies. In the
last chapter of the thesis, we present experiments carried out in our behaviours
virtual laboratory showing the main properties of our behaviours production system,
of our social action model, and of our behaviours virtual laboratory itself. Finally,
we discuss about the understanding of adaptive behaviour as a path for
understanding cognition and its evolution.