Environment and Agreement Technologies
Overview of HANA: a Human-Aware Negotiation Architecture
Normative Multi-Agent Systems (Dagstuhl Seminar 12111)
Publication Type:
Journal ArticleSource:
Dagstuhl Reports, Schloss Dagstuhl--Leibniz-Zentrum fuer Informatik, Volume 2, Issue 3, p.23-49 (2012)URL:
http://drops.dagstuhl.de/opus/volltexte/2012/3535Keywords:
Normative Multiagent systems; Autonomous agents and Multiagent systems; Agreement Technologies; NormsAbstract:
This report documents the program and the outcomes of Dagstuhl Seminar 12111 ``Normative Multi-Agent Systems''. Normative systems are systems in the behavior of which norms play a role and which need normative concepts in order to be described or specified. A normative multi-agent system combines models for normative systems (dealing for example with obligations, permissions and prohibitions) with models for multi-agent systems. Norms have been proposed in multi-agent systems and computer science to deal with issues of coordination, security, electronic commerce and institutions, agent organization. However, due to the lack of a unified theory, many multi-agent system researchers are presently developing their own ad hoc concepts and applications. The aim of this Dagstuhl Seminar was to formulate a collective appraisal of the current perspectives in the field and the most promising venues for future activity. In particular, the seminar has been conceived for the writing of a volume titled "A Prospective view of Normative Multi Agent Systems" aimed to become a standard reference in the field and to provide guidelines for future research in normative multi-agent systems.
The Role of MAS as a Decision Support Tool in a Water-Rights Market
Publication Type:
Conference PaperSource:
p.2-17 (2011)Abstract:
Water is getting a more and more scarce resource, which motivates the idea of designing a framework where water rights may be exchanged more freely, thus leading to a more efficient use of water. In this paper, we present a water-right market embedded within a decision support tool designed as a multi-agent system. To our knowledge, there are many sophisticated decision support systems for water management from a hydrological perspective, but they lack of a social perspective. Using a multi-agent system allows us to design intelligent agents that mimic humans, thus implementing different factors such as (mis)conducts, trust criteria and users willingness to water-right trading. Within a decision support tool, we can dynamically change norms and regulation at no cost, and explore the impact on the evolution of the market.
Mixing all these elements together, we have implemented our \emph{mWater} system as an electronic institution that demonstrates very appealing for decision taking and policy makers to test: i) how regulations and norms may modify the users' behaviour, and ii) how the quality indicators of the market are affected.
The Role of MAS as a Decision Support Tool in a Water-Rights Market
Publication Type:
Conference PaperSource:
International Workshop on Agent-based Modeling for Policy Engineering (AMPLE@AAMAS’2011), Taipei, Taiiwan, p.2-17 (2011)Abstract:
Water is getting a more and more scarce resource, which motivates the idea of designing a framework where water rights may be exchanged more freely, thus leading to a more efficient use of water. In this paper, we present a water-right market embedded within a decision support tool designed as a multi-agent system. To our knowledge, there are many sophisticated decision support systems for water management from a hydrological perspective, but they lack of a social perspective. Using a multi-agent system allows us to design intelligent agents that mimic humans, thus implementing different factors such as (mis)conducts, trust criteria and users willingness to water-right trading. Within a decision support tool, we can dynamically change norms and regulation at no cost, and explore the impact on the evolution of the market.
Mixing all these elements together, we have implemented our mWater system as an electronic institution that demonstrates very appealing for decision taking and policy makers to test: i) how regulations and norms may modify the users' behaviour, and ii) how the quality indicators of the market are affected.
Engineering trust alignment: Theory, method and experimentation
Publication Type:
Journal ArticleSource:
International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Elsevier, Volume 70, Issue 6, p.450-473 (2012)URL:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1071581912000353Keywords:
channel theory; inductive logic programmingAbstract:
In open multi-agent systems trust models are an important tool for agents to achieve effective interactions. However, in these kinds of open systems, the agents do not necessarily use the same, or even similar, trust models, leading to semantic differences between trust evaluations in the different agents. Hence, to successfully use communicated trust evaluations, the agents need to align their trust models. We explicate that currently proposed solutions, such as common ontologies or ontology alignment methods, lead to additional problems and propose a novel approach. We show how the trust alignment can be formed by considering the interactions that agents share and describe a mathematical framework to formulate precisely how the interactions support trust evaluations for both agents. We
show how this framework can be used in the alignment process and explain how an alignment should be learned. Finally, we demonstrate this alignment process in practice, using a ?rst-order regression algorithm, to learn an alignment and test it in an example scenario.
Personalizing Communication about Trust
Opening the black box of trust: reasoning about trust models in a BDI agent
Publication Type:
Journal ArticleSource:
Journal of Logic and Computation, Oxford University Press (In Press)Abstract:
Trust models as thus far described in the literature can be seen as a monolithic structure: a trust model is provided with a variety of inputs and the model performs calculations, resulting in a trust evaluation as output. The agent has no direct method of adapting its trust model to its needs in a given context. In this article, we propose a first step in allowing an agent to reason about its trust model, by providing a method for incorporating a computational trust model into the cognitive architecture of the agent. By reasoning about the factors that influence the trust calculation the agent can effect changes in the computational process, thus proactively adapting its trust model. We give a declarative formalization of this system using a multi-context system and we show that three contemporary trust models, BRS, ReGReT and ForTrust can be incorporated into a BDI reasoning system using our framework.
A MAS Decision Support Tool for Water-Right Markets
Publication Type:
Conference ProceedingsSource:
Proc. of 10th Int. Conf. on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems (AAMAS 2011), International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, Taipei, Taiwan, p.1305-1306 (2011)ISBN:
978-0-9826571-7-1Keywords:
agreement technologies; electronic institutions; multi-agent systemsAbstract:
We present a MAS decision support tool, as an open and regulated virtual organization, that uses intelligent agents to manage a flexible water-rights market. The application goal of this tool is to be used as a simulator to assist in decision-making processes of policy-makers. The simulator focuses on demand and, in particular, on the type of regulatory (in terms of norms selection and agents behaviour) and market mechanisms that foster an efficient use of water while also trying to prevent conflicts among parties. Technically, it contributes with a testbed to explore policy-simulation alternatives under an agreement-technology perspective, thus promoting the fulfillment of agreements .
