Turtles = Individual Agents in Your Model¶
In NetLogo, turtles represent the individual actors in whatever social system you’re studying:
Examples:
- Sociology: People in a neighborhood, members of an organization
- Economics: Individual traders, consumers, firms
- Political Science: Voters, political parties, countries
- Psychology: Individual decision-makers with different cognitive styles
Each Turtle Has Properties¶
Just like real people have characteristics, each turtle can have properties:
Built-in properties (every turtle has these):
color- what color is this turtle?size- how big should this turtle appear?xcorandycor- where is this turtle located?heading- which direction is this turtle facing?who- what is this turtle’s unique ID number?
Custom properties (you define these):
age- how old is this person?wealth- how much money does this person have?opinion- what does this person believe about an issue?social-connections- how many friends does this person have?
Turtles Can Move, Interact, Make Decisions¶
Turtles aren’t just static dots - they can:
- Move around the world following rules
- Interact with other nearby turtles
- Make decisions based on their situation
- Change their properties over time
- Remember things that happened to them