[Swarm-Modelling] Is there such a thing as approximate optimization?

[Steve Railsback]

How should I refer to a decision-making approach in which agents make a 
rough-but-realistic approximation of the outcome of each decision 
alternative and then select the alternative with the best approximated 
outcome?

Is there already a term for this approach? Can you call it approximate 
optimization? Or optimal approximation?

The term "constrained optimization" is often used; is there a precedent 
for applying it to this approach?

Steve Railsback