Human-Agent Decision-making: Combining Theory and Practice

Extensive work has been conducted both in game theory and logic to model strategic interaction. An important question is whether we can use these theories to design agents for interacting with people? On the one hand, they provide a formal design specification for agent strategies. On the other hand, people do not necessarily adhere to playing in accordance with these strategies, and their behavior is affected by a multitude of social and psychological factors. In this paper we will consider the question of whether strategies implied by theories of strategic behavior can be used by automated agents that interact proficiently with people. We will focus on automated agents that we built that need to interact with people in two negotiation settings: bargaining and deliberation. For bargaining we will study game-theory based equilibrium agents and for argumentation we will discuss logic-based argumentation theory. We will also consider security games and persuasion games and will discuss the benefits of using equilibrium based agents.Comment: In Proceedings TARK 2015, arXiv:1606.0729

Regional Modelling for Optimal Allocation of Agricultural Crops Considering Environmental Impacts, Housing Value and Leisure Preferences.

Regional planning should consider the impact of agricultural crops on housing value and leisure, as well as on the local environment. We designed an optimization model for allocating agricultural crops based on farmers profits as well as the impact on these three factors. Each crop creates a different landscape, as well as a different effect on shading and noise reduction. These in turn influence the value of nearby housing and the regional leisure opportunities. Each crop also has a positive and negative environmental impact, including potential use of treated wastewater as well as the effects of pesticides and fertilizers. All these factors were combined with economic considerations to suggest the optimal regional allocation of agricultural crops.