Systems Literacy and Precision: A Category Theory Approach

Abstract

The complex problems of today's world require a transdisciplinary approach, and systems thinking offers essential skills for everyone to address these challenges. Fostering systems literacy—understanding a common systems language—is vital for creating a systems-literate society. This involves grasping four key concepts: distinctions, systems, relationships, and perspectives, structured within three learning levels: sensibility (awareness), literacy (knowledge), and capability (understanding). Recent research has explored how to define and measure the systems thinking learning process in non-experts. It conducted an experiment with 97 middle and high school students from the SMILE Program at Oregon State University. The study revealed a statistically significant increase in the understanding of elements, interactions, and roles/purposes, indicating that teaching these concepts enhances systems thinking skills. In this proposed work, we expand on these outcomes by formalizing how students identified elements, interactions, and roles/purposes by incorporating category theory. Category theory will provide a general framework to analyze any kind of system while increasing precision in their analysis. Our belief is that our ability to engage in transdisciplinarity will be enhanced by fostering systems literacy coupled with a precise language in the form of category theory.