DTM.6:4 - Solution
Identify the affected result, recover the connecting relation, construct its effect and compare joint with independent action.
DTM.6:4.1 - Name the variants, result and comparison
Use DTM.1/.2 to identify what continues and how a transmitted instance is recognized. State whether the current result is successful execution, persistence in a participant, uptake elsewhere or a consequence for an affected party.
Choose the comparison at comparable conditions: what would change if the other variant were absent, held fixed or prevented from changing the suspected intermediary? These are different comparisons. A feasible observation or intervention must support the one used.
Do not call one variant a competitor merely because its name occupies a neighboring category. Two differently named methods can draw on different resources; two instances of the same named method can compete for a limited one.
DTM.6:4.2 - Recover the intermediary
Ask what the first variant changes that the second uses or encounters. Possibilities include a resource, a shared response, compatibility with partners, prerequisite capability or the contact network.
For the selected relation, identify the changing quantity or condition, its effect on the second variant and any return effect. Use observations of that relation where possible. Retain independent action or common external cause when the connection remains unresolved.
Distinguish an indirect effect from a direct interaction. A practice can alter the audience available to another without ever being executed by the same participant.
DTM.6:4.3 - Build the dependence from the relation
The construction follows the intermediary:
- Shared limited capacity: account for available capacity and the amount each variant occupies or consumes. Derive each variant’s feasible execution or growth from what remains. A replacement assumption is needed if one unit displaces another.
- Shared response: relate each variant to formation of the response, then relate that response to each variant’s continuation. Unequal sensitivity matters. DTM.9 develops response dynamics, costs and memory.
- Compatibility: relate partner composition and conversion arrangements to successful exchange, its cost and the consequences of adopting the variant. Existing incompatibility need not make exchange impossible.
- Prerequisite capability: relate execution or transmission to the capability supplied by another practice. Separate acquiring the prerequisite from encountering a description of it.
MMP supplies the representation and admissible operations for the dependence. Do not infer any of these mechanisms from the word “competition.”
DTM.6:4.4 - Compare independent and coupled results
Evaluate the same result under the independent account and the account containing the proposed relation. Keep other relevant conditions comparable. Examine a range of plausible conditions when the effect’s sign or size changes with them.
A negative immediate effect can coexist with a positive later effect. For example, training consumes current execution time but may enlarge later capability. Give the horizon; do not compress the two into an unexplained positive or negative coefficient.
For establishment of a rare variant, evaluate its continuation in the environment maintained by the resident variants. That invasion calculation belongs to DTM.4 and is needed only when establishment is the question. Coexistence, switching order and transient disruption can require different analyses.
DTM.6:4.5 - Choose a distinguishing observation and pass the result on
Use MMP.16 to identify an observation or permissible comparison that differs between the coupled account and its serious alternative. If removing one variant also changes resources, staffing and audience, the result alone does not isolate the proposed mechanism.
Return the conditional dependence, comparison and unresolved alternatives. DTM.3 links the effect to transmission between participants; DTM.4 investigates persistence. Use DTM.7 only if a shared mechanism is actually diverted from its intended result. Ordinary resource competition does not establish diversion or intent.