Kova Developers Give CREATE Talk at the University of Southern Denmark

1 December 2025

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On Monday, December 1st, Puja Bhagat and Jonathan Wong, developers of Kova PedSim, delivered a lecture titled: “Modeling Human Behavior with Kova PedSim: A Socially-Driven Agent-Based Approach”. The talk was presented as part of the Advanced Computational Design (ACD) course in the CREATE program at the University of Southern Denmark and was hosted in an online webinar format.

The session explored a fundamental question facing contemporary architectural practice: How can we meaningfully integrate human behavior into computational design workflows?

While parametric tools have transformed how we model form, structure, and performance, modeling social interaction and pedestrian dynamics remains one of the most complex challenges in digital design. The lecture introduced Kova PedSim as a platform developed to address this gap — bringing socially driven, agent-based simulation directly into the architectural workflow.

Rather than treating people as abstract density values or static occupancy counts, Kova PedSim models individuals as dynamic agents influenced by:

• Attraction and repulsion forces

• Environmental constraints

• Social behaviors

• Contextual awareness and perception

This socially grounded approach allows designers to simulate how space influences movement and how movement, in turn, reshapes spatial performance. Students and faculty engaged with questions about how socially driven simulations can inform urban design, circulation planning, public space strategy, and architectural programming. The session also highlighted how behavioral simulation is not just a visualization tool, but a decision-support system, helping designers evaluate flow efficiency, spatial bottlenecks, experiential quality, and emergent social dynamics.

The team from Kova PedSim are grateful to the CREATE program and the Advanced Computational Design course for hosting this discussion and for fostering dialogue around socially responsive computational tools. We look forward to continuing conversations around computational design, socially driven simulation, and the evolving relationship between digital tools and human experience.