Migrons

Migrons are a theoretical construct used in agent-based and computational models to represent individual migratory units within a population. They function as simplified proxies for people or other migrating agents in simulations of regional and global movement patterns.

Each migron carries attributes such as origin, destination, age, education level, and sensitivity to push and pull factors. Movement is dictated by rules that encode unemployment, disaster risk, safety, economic opportunity, distance, travel costs, and network connectivity. Migrons can have probabilistic relocation decisions and may exhibit path dependency, settlement choice, and potential return migration.

In practice, migrons support scenario analysis for urban and regional planning, climate adaptation, and labor mobility. Researchers use migrons to test the effects of policy changes, infrastructure investments, visa regimes, or housing supply on migration routes, settlement patterns, and regional population distribution.

Limitations include the simplification of complex human decision making, potential miscalibration to real data, and ethical concerns about treating people as abstract agents. Model results are sensitive to assumptions about preferences, information, and network structure, so validation and transparent reporting are essential.

See also: agent-based model; migration; mobility modeling; demographic simulation.