Negotiations Over Time in a Multi-Agent Environment: Preliminary Report

One of the major foci of research in distributed artificial intelligence (DAI) is the design of automated agents which can interact effectively in order to cooperate in problem-solving. Negotiation is recognized as an important means by which inter-agent cooperation is achieved. In this paper we suggest a strategic model of negotiation for N agents (N ≥ 3), that takes the passage of time during the negotiation process itself into consideration. Changes in the agent's preferences over time will change their strategies in the negotiation and, as a result, the agreements they are willing to reach. We will show that in this model the delay in reaching such agreements can be shortened and in some cases avoided altogether.

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