Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

Meaning Negotiation for Consensus Formation in Ontology Integration

Jonice Oliveira'. Jairo de Souza'. Melise Paula'. Jano Moreira de Souza' 2'COPPEIUFRJ - Computer Science Department, Graduate School ofEngineering, Federal

University ofRio de Janeiro, Brazil.2DCC-IMIUFRJ - Computer Science Department, Mathematics Institute, Federal University ofRio de

Janeiro, Braziltjonice, jairo, mel, janoa)cos.ufrj.br

Abstract

In project teams, having an unique vocabulary and a

common understanding about terms is essential to thesuccess of the project. This issue especially disturbs a

design project, which has a multidisciplinary team andmust consist of people with specific and differentknowledge, from diverse domains, to execute specialactivities. Negotiation arises from this context as a

process for the construction of consensus. The goal ofthis work is to present a model of negotiation to obtainthe consensus of meanings, based on models of businessnegotiation, and consequently, deal with conflicts and themultiplicity of understandings of a concept, making thisnegotiation a way for creating value for all agentsinvolved.

Keywords: CSCW, Collaborative Meaning Negotiation,Ontology Construction, Knowledge Management.

1. Introduction

In our global economic and information readiness,information overload is a fact, not a theory, and there isevidence that most people lack the skills or tools to keepup in the Knowledge Age. Nowadays, all majoreconomic players have decentralized organizationalstructures, with multiple units acting in parallel and withsignificant autonomy [1]. Currently, computational toolsand humans have to handle a variety of informationsources, with data in several formats, patterns anddifferent quality degrees. Grasping relevant informationwherever it may be and exchanging information with allpotential partners has become an essential challenge forenterprise survival [1]. The reason that makes semanticsso important is that information now has to be 'sharable'and disseminated in a faster way, in a distributedenvironment, where people or software do not necessarilyshare a common understanding.

Another issue that highlights the importance of an

understanding consensus is the continuous growth ofmulti-disciplinary teams, especially in activities related to

product design. There are many advantages to this kind ofwork, amongst which we can point: rapid prototyping,cost reduction and the design of a more marketable andreliable product. While multi-disciplinary teams arecommon in design environments, it is more problematicalto find a common vocabulary, an agreement overmeaning, which will aim at information and knowledgeexchange, besides a common understanding of tasks,activities and works.

Emergent semantic aims to establish semanticinteroperability from a consensus, in relation tointerpretations that are common in a particular context.Considering the evolving character of information, whosesemantics are enriched by interpretation, handling, anduse in a particular context, the interoperability isconditioned by the way the concordance of interpretationsof meaning is set. Negotiation arises from this context asa process that is appropriate for the construction ofconsensus. However, as interpretations are notnecessarily shared at first, semantic interoperabilitybecomes dependent of the frequency, quality, andefficiency with which such negotiations are conducted inorder to achieve agreement. In the negotiations thatencompass meanings and interpretations, eachparticipating agent can be regarded as an independentdecision-maker that carries one's own individualperception and judgment regarding the issues underconsideration.

Given that in negotiation all the parties involved haveto contribute for the agreement not to be reached in anunilateral fashion, it can be seen as inter-dependentdecision process. Taking into account that eachnegotiator possesses different knowledge, experiencesand focus, the conciliation of objectives or meaningscontributes to the complexity of this kind of negotiation.Thus, there is the need for establishing a management ofthe process of consensus formation, guaranteeing theincremental and evolving aspects of these agreements.

With this assertion in mind, the goal of this work is topresent a model of negotiation to obtain the consensus ofmeanings, that is, semantic consensus, which represents astructured way to deal with the possible conflicts, andwith the multiplicity of ideas, making this negotiation a

1-4244-0165-8/06/$20.00 C 2006 IEEE.

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

productive process, and a way of creating value for allagents involved by the creation of an ontology. For thispurpose, some negotiation principles will be explained insection 2 and our model will be described in section 3.Apart from the model, we show some correlated works inthis area in section 4. Opportunities and challenges, andthe conclusion and future works related to negotiationapplied to consensus meaning are outlined in section 5.

2. Negotiation

Negotiation is a process of social interaction andcommunication that involves distribution andredistribution of power, resources, and commitments. Itinvolves two or more people who make decisions andengage in the exchange of information in order toestablish a compromise. Many important decisions haveto be negotiated because people need to share anddistribute scarce resources. The interpersonal character,the participants' independence as decision-makingentities, and their interdependence in their inability toachieve goals unilaterally, contribute to the complexity ofthe negotiation [2].

Traditionally, two kinds of negotiation exist:competitive and cooperative [3], [4], [5]. Competitivenegotiation is classified as Win/Lose. The negotiatorwith a Win/Lose posture chooses the competition and theshort time. Thus, the fulfillment of the wishes of oneparty may be directly detrimental to the fulfillment of thewishes of another party. This type of negotiation hasbeen described as win-lose, zero-sum, pure conflict, andcompetitive. It is a process in which a gain for one partyis a loss for the other and one where each partymaximizes one's own outcome. Walton and McKersiepoint that distributive bargaining is often a competitionover the division of resources; who achieves moredepends largely on the strategies and tactics employed [6].Parties have a fixed-pie perception and focus on theirdifferences, ignoring what they have in common [7].

Cooperative negotiation (also known as collaborativeor integrative negotiation) is classified as Win/Win. It isa cooperative process in which involved parties findalternatives for common earnings, that is, which cater tothe interests of all the parties [8], [3], [5].

According to Lomuscio et. al. [9], negotiation can bedefined as a 'Process by which a group of agentscommunicates with one another to try and come to amutually-acceptable agreement on some matter'. In thisdefinition, the stress falls on words such as 'agent','communicate', and 'mutually acceptable'. The partiesinvolved in the negotiation process are not necessarilypeople, but can be any type of actors, such as softwareagents.

These actors communicate according to a negotiationprotocol and act according to a strategy. The protocol

determines the flow of messages between the negotiatingparties and acts as the rules by which the negotiatingparties must abide by if they are to interact. The protocolis public and open. The strategy, on the other hand, is theway through which a given party acts within those rules,in an effort to get the best outcome of the negotiation.The strategy of each participant is, therefore, private [10],[1 1].

As with every process, a negotiation can be divided instages. In Kersten and Noronha [12], the authors suggestthree phases of the negotiation: pre-negotiation, conductof negotiation and post-settlement.

In the pre-negotiation stage, the objective is theunderstanding of the negotiation problem. This stageinvolves the analysis of the situation, problem, opponent,issues, alternatives, preference, reservation levels andstrategy. Moreover, in this phase, negotiators plan theagenda for the negotiations and develop their BATNA.BATNA is the acronym for "Best Alternative To a

Negotiated Agreement", created by Roger Fisher andWilliam Ury [11]. The BATNA can be identified in anynegotiation situation by the question, "What will we do ifthis negotiation is not successful?" In the simplest terms,if the proposed agreement is better than your BATNA,then you should accept it. If the agreement is not betterthan your BATNA, then you should reopen negotiations.If you cannot improve the agreement, then you should atleast consider withdrawing from the negotiations andpursuing your alternative (though the costs of doing somust also be considered). One of the main reasons forentering a negotiation is to achieve better results thanwould be possible without negotiating [13]. More detailson the BATNA can be found in [11], [14], [15].

The second stage in the negotiation, Conduct ofnegotiation, involves exchanges of messages, offers andcounter-offers based on different strategies and the kindsof negotiation. The post-settlement analysis stageinvolves only the evaluation of the negotiation outcomesgenerated, and, afterwards, the negotiation activity.These outcomes include the information on thecompromise and the negotiators' satisfaction.

In collaborative negotiation, an important issue we canstress is value creation. The four key features ofcollaborative negotiation, which allow one to distinguishit from competitive negotiation are: value creation, focuson interests and not positions, openness, and exchange ofrelevant information, learning and problem restructuring[16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. Different authors highlightthe significance of these characteristics and their impacton the parties' willingness to collaborate rather thancompete, to seek new possibilities rather than defend theirown positions, to work jointly on solving problems ratherthan demanding more resources, but value creation iswhat will show the benefits of cooperation. As per [23],three interpretations of value creation are possible:

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

I IPreparation I Conduction I Post-I of I SettlementI Negotiation II II I

Fiqure I - Meaninq Neqotiation Process1. The parties know the set of offers from the outset

and select offers that dominate their previous offers.2. The set of offers is not known to the parties but

known to someone else (e.g., analysts). The parties selectdominating offers and the third party guides them inachieving an efficient compromise.

3. No one knows the set of offers; during thenegotiation the parties realize the possibilities to achievemore, and select offers which dominate the previousoffers.

Based in these negotiation concepts, in the next sectionwe describe our negotiation model to focus on theconsensus for meaning.

3. Meaning Negotiation

Semantic interoperability is seen as an emergentphenomenon constructed incrementally, and its state atany given point in time depends on the frequency, thequality and the efficiency with which negotiations can beconducted to reach agreements on commoninterpretations within the context of a given task [1]. Asthe set of mutual beliefs shapes the "agreement" or"consensus" between the interacting agents, humans ornot, we believe that the most convenient and appropriatetype of negotiation, when we envision the meaning ofconsensus in a multidisciplinary team, to be thecollaborative kind. The reason is the need to know, tolearn and to understand the special and relevantknowledge of people from different domains ofknowledge which will be the base of a job well done andprobably, the responsibility in competitive value.However, as per [24], meaningful exchanges can onlyoccur on the basis of mutually accepted propositions.

So, our model is divided in 3 stages,negotiation, conduct of negotiation andThis model can be seen in Figure .

which are: pre-post-settlement.

3.1. Pre-Negotiation

Pre-negotiation refers to the discussions that precedeformal negotiations. In our model for meaning negotiation,these phases are divided as follows:3.1.1. To choose the personal or domain ontology. Inthis stage, the user should choose an ontology to representthe knowledge of his/her domain. Each of theseontologies (one by domain) will be the base for theprocess of ontology integration.3.1.2. To specify the importance and malleabilitydegrees of terms and concepts. For the ontology whichchosen in the previous step, the user has to define thedegree of importance for each concept and relationship.The degree of importance is an integer value, between 1to 5 (1 - the lowest 'it is not so important' value, 5 - thehighest 'it is very important' value) and represents theimportance, and the relevance of a concept in theontology, or the importance of a relationship between twoconcepts in the same ontology. The definition of thedegree of importance is optional, and the concept andrelationships for which the user does not define a degreeof importance are automatically assigned with value 1.

Analogously, the user has to characterize themalleability degree. It means the range in which the useraccepts to modify a concept definition or a relationshipbetween two concepts. The malleability degree is aninteger value between 1 to 5 (1- the lowest 'it can bechanged without any problem' value, 5 - the highest 'it isimpossible to change' value). The definition of the

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

~ ~~ ~ ~~~ ~ ~~ ~ ~~~ ~ ~~ ~ ~~ ~ ~~ ~ ~~ ~ ~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.malleability degree is optional, and the concept andrelationships for which the user does not define the -malleability degree are automatically assigned with value1. The combination of these degrees will be used in step3.2., as show in Figure, which means the status ofconcepts and its relationships in an ontology.

Importance

Well known,but not well defined

_ The definition andthe usability hasto be better

_ defined

Strong CohesionHighly Well DefinedVery used

Well defined, but notvery used and notknown enough

Figure 3 - An Ontology edited by COE

3.2. Conduct of Negotiation

Malleability

Figure 2 - Degree of importance x

malleability degree

3.1.3. BATNA Construction. BATNA means "bestalternative to a negotiated agreement". BATNAs are

critical to negotiation because the negotiator can not makea wise decision on whether to accept a negotiatedagreement unless he/she knows what his/her alternativesare. The BATNA is the only standard which can protectthe negotiator from accepting terms that are toounfavourable and from rejecting terms it would be inhis/her interest to accept. It means that if the proposedagreement is better than the negotiator's BATNA, thenhe/she should accept it. If the agreement is not better thanhis/her BATNA, then he/she should reopen negotiations.If he/she cannot improve the agreement, then he/sheshould at least consider withdrawing from thenegotiations and pursuing his/her alternative (though thecosts of doing that must be considered as well).

Having a good BATNA increases negotiating power.

Therefore, it is important to improve the BATNAwhenever possible. The BATNA should be filled outwith all the desired possibilities to an ontologyconstruction: all the concepts that can be negotiated,which the user waits with this negotiation process, all thealternatives, and so on.

3.1.4. To publish the personal or domain ontology.After the user defines the importance and malleabilitydegrees and constructs his/her BATNA, it is time topublish his/her ontology to a public place, wherenegotiators can find and access all ontologies. After theuser has seen other ontologies, he/she can refine his/herBATNA. For the ontology definition (steps 3.1.1, 3.1.2,3.1.4) the user employs the COE editor [25], as shown inFigure 3.

The actual conduct of the negotiation is where whichcounterparts exchange a series of messages and offers,creating a suitable atmosphere for the negotiation,presenting their side of the case, and bargaining until theyreach an agreement. The parties may conduct negotiationswith the assistance of one or more neutral third parties,using a person or a team as mediator. The conduct ofnegotiation is divided in two phases, as follows:3.2.1. Attempt at Automatic Integration. In this stage,the environment tries to automatically integrate theontologies, supporting this action with the degrees ofimportance and malleability, and the syntax and semanticanalysis. The syntax and semantic analysis are based onthe proposal of Conceptual Schema Integration, describedin [27].

The result of automatic integration (if it wascomputationally possible) is posted to the negotiators sothat they evaluate the result. If all of them agree with theresult, then, the next step is 3.3 (Post-Settlement). Ifsomeone disagrees, then, all the members are invited toparticipate at the negotiation table.3.2.2. Negotiation Table. Negotiations are arguments.Argumentation, not a derogatory term, is a practice ofachieving a common sense through parties that takecontrary positions. Here, the members can debate,exposing their positions, arguments and counter-arguments for a concept definition and its relationships inan ontology. It is not only helpful in discoveringcompacts, but the essence of constructive socialinteraction. To aim at this negotiation phase, users canconsult their first ontology, the BATNA, the ontologies ofthe other members and the ontology resulting from step3.2.1. This negotiation is made in a synchronouselectronic environment and all the messages arecategorizes using the IBIS methodology (Issue BasedInformation Systems), as in Figure . The discoursedevelops around single issues, in our case a conceptdefinition or relationship between concepts, which

0

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

somebody raises assuming that their treatment would berelevant for the ontology integration. The participantstake different positions, defend their positions, opposeothers, and weigh one aspect against another, througharguments.

o

I / L= --o,0

CD --(a

CD

Position Argi

/\Counter-Argument

T 1

/

Position ArgL

'\Counter-Argument

ument

ument

Figure 4 - Message categorization using the IBISmethodology

All messages have relations. Every argument isassigned at least to one position, every position at least toone issue, every issue to at least one topic. Arguments"support" or "oppose" a position; positions "respond" toissues. Other relations can exist between all elements ofIBIS. For instance, an argument can relate to anotherargument, and also to one which belongs to anotherposition of another issue. Or a counter-argument can

relate to a position of another issue, and differentpositions can be related (as a "derivative" relation), too.The relations form a network and this network is storedafter the negotiation ends.

3.3. Post-Settlement

The post-settlement is the period after an agreementhas already been reached, or if not, the negotiation iscancelled or a renegotiating process can be analyzed. Inour case, if the meaning agreement was reached, then thenext steps are done.3.3.1. Context storage. All information which helps torepresent the context - as BATNAS, previous domainontologies, importance and malleability degrees, theattempts at ontology integration and the log of thenegotiation table (with the messages IBIS categorization),and the final ontology - are storage.3.3.2. Ontology dissemination. The integrated and finalontology is disseminated to the team.

4. Related Work

There are several works dealing with related issues,such as information integration, schemas and ontology

matchmaking, negotiation in agents' communication andcontext elicitation. An extended analysis of EmergentSemantic Systems is made in [1] and computationalmechanisms can be found in this reference. In [26] wefound a consensus approach for deriving semanticknowledge on the Web. The significance of informationsharing and distribution of cultural knowledge hasencouraged some researchers to exploit consensus,measured by inter-subject agreement, as an indicator ofknowledge. The method of Consensus Analysis was firstpresented in several seminal papers [33][34][35]. Inaddition to introducing the formal foundation forConsensus Analysis, the initial papers cited above alsoprovided examples of its application to modelingknowledge of general information among US collegestudents, and the classification of illness concepts amongurban Guatemalans. Other more recent applications ofConsensus Analysis have focused on measuring culturaldiversity within organizations [36] and different degreesof expertise in organizations and communities of practicecreation [28].

Our work is different. It is an attempt to use already-known techniques of negotiation, usually employed in thebusiness scenario, and to try and bring these concepts toontology integration. Using this idea, our work is unique.

5. Conclusion and Future Works

The lack of any efficient semantic agreementmechanisms makes semantic integrity in heterogeneousenvironments very difficult for the participating parties.This problem is stressed in design project, wheremultidisciplinary groups have to work with andunderstand each other.

Initial approaches rely on some pre-defined corpus ofterms serving as an initial context for defining newconcepts or make use of gossiping and local translationmappings to incrementally foster interoperability in thelarge, but this is not enough. In this work we are based ona negotiation model to conduct a semantic agreement in aprocess of ontology integration. We did not find anequivalent work in literature, that is, this attempt atmapping how business negotiations are made intosemantic agreements is exclusive.

As future work, we envision the use of data miningtechniques to find patterns of i) meaning X domains; ii)agreement reaching x person profile; and iii) importanceof terms x domains.

Acknowledgement

This work has the financial support of CAPES (TheBrazilian Coordination for Postgraduate StaffImprovement) and CNPq (The Brazilian Council forScientific and Technological Development).

Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work in Design

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