Modelling Norms

The book focusses on questions of individual and collective action, the emergence and dynamics of social norms and the feedback between individual behaviour and social phenomena. It discusses traditional modelling approaches to social norms and shows the usefulness of agent-based modelling for the study of these micro-macro interactions. Existing agent-based models of social norms are discussed and it is shown that so far too much priority has been given to parsimonious models and questions of the emergence of norms, with many aspects of social norms, such as norm-change, not being modelled. Juvenile delinquency, group radicalisation and moral decision making are used as case studies for agent-based models of collective action extending existing models by providing an embedding into social networks, social influence via argumentation and a causal action theory of moral decision making. The major contribution of the book is to highlight the multifaceted nature of the dynamics of social norms, consisting not only of emergence, and the importance of embedding of agent-based models into existing theory.

This book constitutes the thoroughly reviewed joint postprocessings of two international workshops on Coordination, Organization, Institutions and Norms in Agent Systems, COIN@AAMAS 2010, held in Toronto, Canada in May 2010 and COIN@MALLOW 2010, held in Lyon, France in August 2010. The 20 revised full papers presented went through several rounds of reviewing and revision and were carefully selected for presentations. The papers are organized in topical sections on normative systems design and modeling; social aspects; and norms at runtime: learning and enforcing.

This book explores the view that normative behaviour is part of a complex of social mechanisms, processes and narratives that are constantly shifting. From this perspective, norms are not a kind of self-contained social object or fact, but rather an interplay of many things that we label as norms when we ‘take a snapshot’ of them at a particular instant. Further, this book pursues the hypothesis that considering the dynamic aspects of these phenomena sheds new light on them. The sort of issues that this perspective opens to exploration include: Of what is this complex we call a "social norm" composed of? How do new social norms emerge and what kind of circumstances might facilitate such an appearance? How context-specific are the norms and patterns of normative behaviour that arise? How do the cognitive and the social aspects of norms interact over time? How do expectations, beliefs and individual rationality interact with social norm complexes to effect behaviour? How does our social embeddedness relate to social constraint upon behaviour? How might the socio-cognitive complexes that we call norms be usefully researched?

This volume presents an unprecedented attempt to illustrate via agent based simulation the emergence of norms meant as prescribed conducts applied by the majority. The simulated scenarios are populated with cognitive agents generating norms by detecting and deciding to respect them.

Choosing Models of Society and Social Norms offers an innovative approach to social norms and decision-making that encourages the identification of social norms, along with their causes and consequences. Adolfo Critto points out that social norms condition behavior, but are also conditioned by human decisions. He notes that social norms generally only provide partial and temporary solutions to human needs and problems, so must be critically analyzed in order to understand their relationship to decision making. Critto approaches this relationship through "sacred" (focused on transcendent ends) and "expedient" (focused on efficient means) value orientations, warning that a one-sided focus on either of these orientations leads to inconsistency. He stresses the importance of language, communication, and education, showing how they relate to social norms. Through his analysis, the author provides an understanding of the creation of social norms, what influences them, and the evaluation of those that already exist.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-workshop proceedings of the International Workshop on Coordination, Organization, Institutions and Norms in Agent Systems, COIN 2009.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 9th International Workshops on Coordination, Organizations, Institutions and Norms in Agent Systems, COIN 2013. The workshops were co-located with AAMAS 2013, held in St. Paul, MN, USA in May 2013, and with PRIMA 2013, held in Dunedin, New Zealand, in December 2013. The 18 full papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 28 submissions and are presented together with two invited papers. The papers are organized in topical sections such as coordination, organizations, institutions, norms, norm conflict, and norm-aware agents.

This book constitutes the thoroughly reviewed joint post-conference proceedings of two international workshops on Coordination, Organization, Institutions and Norms in Agent Systems, COIN@AAMAS 2011, held in Taipei, Taiwan in May 2011 and COIN@WI-IAT 2011, held in Lyon, France in August 2011. The 12 revised full papers presented were carefully selected for presentations. The papers are organized in topical sections on agent coordination, norm-aware agent reasoning, as well as norm creation and enforcement.