Simulation of Negotiation Policies in Distributed Multiagent Resource Allocation

Abstract

In distributed approaches to multiagent resource allocation, the agents belonging to a society negotiate deals in small groups at a local level, driven only by their own rational interests. We can then observe and study the effects such negotiation has at the societal level, for instance in terms of the economic efficiency of the emerging allocations. Such effects may be studied either using theoretical tools or by means of simulation. In this paper, we present a new simulation platform that can be used to compare the effects of different negotiation policies and we report on initial experiments aimed at gaining a deeper understanding of the dynamics of distributed multiagent resource allocation.