Table of Contents

1.Introduction
Abdulrahman M. El-Sayed

SECTION 1: Simplicity, complexity and population health

2. Reductionism at the dawn of population health
Kristin Heitman

3. Wrong answers: when simple interpretations create complex problems
David S. Fink, Katherine M. Keyes

4. Complexity: the evolution towards 21st century science
Anton Palma, David W. Lounsbury

5. Systems thinking in population health research and policy
Stephen Mooney

SECTION 2: Methods in systems population health

6. Generation of systems maps: mapping complex systems of population health
Helen de Pinho

7. Systems dynamics models
Eric Lofgren

8. Agent-based modeling
Brandon Marshall

9. Microsimulation
Sanjay Basu

10. Social network analysis: the ubiquity of social networks
and their importance for population health
Douglas A. Luke, Amar Dhand, Bobbi J. Carothers

SECTION 3: Systems science towards a consequential population health

11. Machine learning
James H. Faghmous

12. Systems science and the social determinants of population health
David S. Fink, Katherine M. Keyes, Magdalena Cerdá

13. Systems approaches to understanding how the environment
influences population health and population health interventions
Melissa Tracy

14. Systems of behavior and population health
Mark Orr, Kathryn Ziemer, Daniel Chen

15. Systems under your skin
Karina Standahl Olsen, Hege Bøvelstad, Eiliv Lund

16. Frontiers in health modeling
Nathaniel Osgood

17. Systems science and population health
Abdulrahman M. El-Sayed, Sandro Galea

About the Author

Abdulrahman M. El-Sayed, MD, DPhil, is a public health physician and epidemiologist. He serves the City of Detroit as the Executive Director of the Detroit Health Department and Health Officer. Under his leadership, the Detroit Health Department has emerged as a state and national leader in promoting healthy air quality, lead elimination, and public health innovation. Dr. El-Sayed's research explores urban health policy, the social determinants of health, and
health inequalities. Previously, he was a professor in the Department of Epidemiology at Columbia University.


Sandro Galea, MD, DrPH, is a physician and an epidemiologist interested in the social production of health of urban populations. His work explores innovative cells-to-society approaches to population health questions. He is interested in advancing a consequentialist approach to population health scholarship. He currently serves as Robert A. Knox Professor and Dean of the School of Public Health at Boston University. He is a past president of the Society for Epidemiologic Research, and an
elected member of the National Academy of Medicine.

Together they have been engaged in systems science scholarship and education for more than 15 years.