The Pocket Negotiator , synergy between man and machine

Negotiation is a complex emotional decision-making process aiming to reach an agreement to exchange goods or services. Although a daily activity, few people are effective negotiators. Existing support systems make a significant improvement if the negotiation space is well-understood, because computers can better cope with the computational complexity. However, the negotiation space can only be properly developed if the human parties jointly explore their interests. The inherent semantic problem and the emotional issues involved make that negotiation cannot be handled by artificial intelligence alone, and a human-machine collaborative system is required. I propose to lead a team of people that will develop a new type of humanmachine collaborative system that combines the strengths of both and reduces the weaknesses. Fundamental in these systems will be that user and machine explicitly share a generic task model. Furthermore, such systems are to support humans in coping with emotions and moods in human-human interactions. For this purpose we will contribute new concepts, methods and techniques. For integrative bargaining we will develop such a system, called a Pocket Negotiator, to collaborate with human negotiators. The Pocket Negotiator will handle computational complexity issues, and provide biddingand interaction advice, the user will handle background knowledge and interaction with the opponent negotiator. The Pocket Negotiator will enhance the negotiation skills and performance o f the user by increasing the user’s capacity for exploration of the negotiation space, reducing the cognitive task load, preventing mental errors, and improving win-win outcomes. We will devise a negotiation model that matches human cognitive representations of negotiation, and develop methods and tools to support humans in coping with emotions. Two negotiation domains, labour agreements and real estate acquisition, with associated experts provide the development ground for the Pocket Negotiator. We will validate the techniques and tools in training situations, and realistic experiments.