Pandemic for Teaching Contagion: Illustrating simple and complex contagious spread through interactive board game play.

• In Event: 20461 - Teaching and Learning Symposium Roundtable Session
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table 4: Teaching with Films, Games, & Community Engagement

Abstract

This presentation will provide audience members with an effective lesson for introducing the concept of peer-to-peer contagious spread illustrating how ‘simple’ contagions (like a virus) and ‘complex’ contagions (like a new medical intervention) spread through a network in unique ways. Derived from the board game Pandemic, this lesson teaches about ‘complex’ and ‘simple’ network contagions via a memorable cooperative board game style activity. Network spread (contagion, influence, and diffusion) is a significant area within social networks literature, but the concepts that students need to learn to understand this area of network science are not elementary and can be laborious to learn and teach in a standard undergraduate lecture setting. This game introduces students to the concepts of ‘simple’ and ‘complex’ network contagions, how each spread via social network processes, and what network features promote or constrain spread, all in the context of a fun, intuitive lesson. By teaching these concepts in a game format, students are able to synthesize the concept components quickly and get hands-on experience manipulating and experimenting with how different types of contagions behave in a system. Set on a map of the US and Europe, game play starts with an outbreak of a virus (a simple contagion) in one city and the goal of the game is for the students to spread the adoption of vaccines (a complex contagion) through the network while curtailing the spread of the virus. Students work together to travel around the map treating the virus and promoting the vaccine, using their knowledge of how complex and simple contagions behave in a network to strategize most effective actions. The game serves as a tangible, foundational jumping-off point for more nuanced and advanced discussions of contagion processes and the varied and unique characteristics of peer-to-peer spread through social networks.

Author

• Hannah W Espy, Lycoming College