Improving negotiations with bar charts: The advantages of priority awareness

Negotiations seldom lead to optimal results for the negotiators. The missing knowledge about the priorities of the negotiating parties is one known reason for this. This experimental study examines the effects of priority awareness on different measures of negotiation outcomes. Priority awareness is the awareness of one negotiator about the priorities of the other negotiator. One hundred thirty-two participants were randomly assigned to negotiation pairs in an experimental condition with priority awareness – created implicitly through the usage of an ordinary bar chart – or a control condition without priority awareness. They took over the roles of a car seller or buyer and negotiated within an experimental negotiation support system. They were neither explicitly instructed to use the bar chart in the negotiation or about its benefits, nor were they restricted in sharing any kind of information. The experimental condition showed not only a significantly higher negotiation performance in the form of joint outcome and pareto efficiency than the control condition, but also a higher impasse rate. Creating awareness about each other's priorities in a negotiation has a positive effect on the negotiation performance without noticeable negative effects on satisfaction with, or fairness and duration of, the negotiation.     

KEMNAD: A KNOWLEDGE ENGINEERING METHODOLOGY FOR NEGOTIATING AGENT DEVELOPMENT

Automated negotiation is widely applied in various domains. However, the development of such systems is a complex knowledge and software engineering task. So, a methodology there will be helpful. Unfortunately, none of existing methodologies can offer sufficient, detailed support for such system development. To remove this limitation, this paper develops a new methodology made up of (1) a generic framework (architectural pattern) for the main task, and (2) a library of modular and reusable design pattern (templates) of subtasks. Thus, it is much easier to build a negotiating agent by assembling these standardized components rather than reinventing the wheel each time. Moreover, because these patterns are identified from a wide variety of existing negotiating agents (especially high impact ones), they can also improve the quality of the final systems developed. In addition, our methodology reveals what types of domain knowledge need to be input into the negotiating agents. This in turn provides a basis for developing techniques to acquire the domain knowledge from human users. This is important because negotiation agents act faithfully on the behalf of their human users and thus the relevant domain knowledge must be acquired from the human users. Finally, our methodology is validated with one high impact system.     

自动信任协商的形式化描述与验证研究

首先提出了自动信任协商的通用形式化框架,并将典型的信任协商策略规约到上述框架内;其次,基于上述形式化框架对自动信任协商的形式化验证问题进行了定义,确定了形式化验证的目标以及一般流程;再次,研究了典型信任协商策略的形式化验证问题,讨论了相关问题的计算复杂性并得到系列结论;最后,利用逻辑编程方法和模型检测方法实现了自动信任协商的形式化验证。实验结果表明,规则数是影响形式化验证系统运行时间的关键因素,逻辑编程方法和模型检测方法在规则较少时效率较高,但逻辑编程方法的可扩展性不及模型检测方法。     

基于元本体的本体协商方法的研究

本体作为领域共享的形式化概念模型,是实现服务自动化以及服务互操作的有效手段,多本体之间的异构妨碍了系统之间的信息共享与集成。结合元本体理论和本体协商的思想解决本体异构,实现本体之间的互操作。该方法在本体协商过程中以元本体为基础,借助本体之间共享的元本体对系统之间的通信信息进行解释和确认,从而提高本体协商的效率。最后通过一个简单实例说明了基于元本体进行本体协商的大致过程。     

A non‐repudiable negotiation protocol for security service level agreements

Security service level agreements (SSLAs) provide a systematic way for end users at home or in the office to guarantee sufficient security level when doing business or exchanging sensitive personal or organizational data with an online service. In this paper, we propose an SSLA negotiation protocol that implements non‐repudiation with cryptographic identities and digital signatures and includes features that make it resistant to denial of service attacks. The basic version of the protocol does not rely on the use of a trusted third party, and it can be used for all kinds of simple negotiations. For the negotiation about SSLAs, the protocol provides an option to use an external knowledge base that may help the user in the selection of suitable security measures. We have implemented a prototype of the system, which uses JSON Web Signature for the message exchange and made some performance tests with it. The results show that the computational effort required by the cryptographic operations of the negotiation protocol remains at a reasonable level. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Negotiation as a form of persuasion: Arguments in first offers.

In this article we examined aspects of negotiation within a persuasion framework. Specifically, we investigated how the provision of arguments that justified the first offer in a negotiation affected the behavior of the parties, namely, how it influenced counteroffers and settlement prices. In a series of 4 experiments and 2 pilot studies, we demonstrated that when the generation of counterarguments was easy, negotiators who did not add arguments to their first offers achieved superior results compared with negotiators who used arguments to justify their first offer. We hypothesized and provided evidence that adding arguments to a first offer was likely to cause the responding party to search for counterarguments, and this, in turn, led him or her to present counteroffers that were further away from the first offer. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

广东电力市场交易系统设计与实现

为落实广东省政府关于深化电力体制改革的有关部署,规范电力市场交易管理,扩大电力大用户与发电企业直接交易电量规模,设计并实现了广东电力市场交易系统。该系统的设计以确保广东电力市场交易工作执行的公平性、交易运行的安全性、稳定性和经济性为目标,应用先进、安全的信息技术手段保证系统运行的高性能与安全性。该系统实现了对广东大用户直购电客户管理、双边协商交易、月度集中竞争交易、合同签订及结算管理等全方位的线上技术支持。自该系统投运以来,运行效果显著,已经成为广东电力交易中心不可或缺的技术支持平台。     

电动汽车参与电力系统优化调度的谈判策略

以电动汽车为代表的灵活电力负荷参与电力系统优化调度可以改善系统运行的经济性,对于这类负荷电力公司或相关管理机构应给予适当的经济激励。考虑到电动汽车代理商与电力系统调度机构之间的信息不对称,这部分经济激励应该由电力公司和电动汽车车主代理通过谈判来确定。在此背景下,研究了电动汽车代理商与电力公司针对电动汽车参与日前优化调度的谈判策略。首先,建立了计及电动汽车代理商参与系统优化调度的数学模型和电动汽车代理商的充电需求模型。之后,根据电动汽车代理商和电力公司分别对电动汽车参与系统优化调度为电力公司带来的收益和电动汽车代理可能遭受的损失的估计,分别给出了其谈判报价策略和报价调整策略。最后,以修改的IEEE 30节点系统为例,对所提出的电动汽车代理商谈判策略进行了仿真分析,说明了所提方法的基本特征。     

无线局域网中一种基于共享秘密的认证和密钥协商协议

针对无线局域网中的便携式通信终端的计算资源、通信能力有限,难以执行大运算量的密码算法问题,提出了一种基于共享秘密的认证方式.该认证方式采用完整性校验码等安全技术为通信双方提供双向认证,由根秘密生成用于不同目的的多种密钥,并构成密钥体系.该认证方式能抵御重放攻击和中间人攻击,而且具有通信量小、计算量小、能提供密钥协商功能等优点,适合在资源受限的设备中用于保护移动通信中的信息安全.     

Getting off on the right foot: Subjective value versus economic value in predicting longitudinal job outcomes from job offer negotiations.

Although negotiation experiences can affect a negotiator's ensuing attitudes and behavior, little is known about their long-term consequences. Using a longitudinal survey design, the authors tested the degree to which economic and subjective value achieved in job offer negotiations predicts employees' subsequent job attitudes and intentions concerning turnover. Results indicate that subjective value predicts greater compensation satisfaction and job satisfaction and lower turnover intention measured 1 year later. Surprisingly, the economic outcomes that negotiators achieved had no apparent effects on these factors. Implications, limitations, and future directions are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)