The goal of this inductive study was to identify factors that facilitate and inhibit binational collaboration in the recovery of endangered species in the northern Mexico borderlands, focusing on the Mexican wolf (Canis lupus baileyi). A conceptual model was developed using qualitative techniques, providing the basis for design of a mail survey. The target population included participants with experience in recovery efforts for over a dozen species at risk in the region. Long interviews were recorded with 44 participants from Mexico and the United States. Thematic hierarchical analysis was used to develop a conceptual model of how interviewees talked about factors influencing binational collaboration. Issues were classified in five thematic clusters: project, organization, people, resources, culture/history. The survey was used to conduct a needs assessment, measuring respondents' attitudes about the relative priority of issues identified in the conceptual model. High priority needs were identified from each thematic cluster: (a) equitable participation in project design and implementation, (b) continuity of personnel, (c) coordination of federal, state and local efforts, (d) increased funding, managed with accountability, and (e) exchange visits to facilitate understanding of diverse perspectives. Responses to almost half the survey items indicated accord among the sample of respondents, providing a basis for shared common ground. The nature of discord was within the range of "manageable", with no clear polarization of attitudes measured. This exploratory data analysis suggested that the structure of the conceptual model developed from the Mexican wolf case study was generally a valid basis for future deductive analysis and reflection by practitioners. For 82% of 22 statements of need, priorities of participants in the Mexican wolf recovery efforts did not differ significantly from other respondents. Nationality (of respondents) significantly affected priority rankings for only 18% of the need statements. Significant effects of five demographic variables indicated that interactive effects should be examined in future multivariate analyses to determine how respondents' attitudes on issues related to priority rankings. Recommendations were provided for a more efficient and effective approach to collaborative problem-solving, engaging reflective practitioners from the private and public sectors in principled negotiation processes to better understand diverse perspectives.

This study investigates the use of authentic subtitled similar task videos (ASSTVs) and their relationship to second language negotiation of meaning and language production among non-native speakers of English in an online task-based language learning (TBLL) environment. Over the course of two weeks, twenty intermediate nonnative speakers (NNSs) of English from the English Language Institute at Texas A&M University engaged in four communicative tasks in pairs using an online TBLL environment designed specifically for this study, and a chat tool in WebCT Vista, a course management system provided by the university. ASSTVs were videotaped and integrated into the online TBLL environment. Participants were divided into two groups, each of which consisted of five dyads, to test the effects of ASSTVs. Five dyads were provided with the ASSTVs and the remaining five dyads were not provided with them before the task completion process. The first section of this study examines the effects of ASSTVs on negotiation of meaning, and the second section examines the effects on language production. The amount of negotiation of meaning was calculated through the negotiation of meaning sequences model developed by Gass and Varonis and revised for online communication by Smith. Language production was investigated in terms of fluency and complexity with regard to lexical and syntactic complexity. A detailed analysis of the data from the chat-scripts showed that NNSs engage in more negotiation of meaning and produce more fluent and lexically diverse language when provided with the ASSTVs than NNSs who were not provided with them. Based on these findings, this study concludes that using ASSTVs in an online TBLL environment is a viable and effective tool for promoting negotiation of meaning and language production in terms of fluency and lexical complexity.

Svensk lönestatistik visar att manliga och kvinnliga ingenjörer har ojämnlika lönenivåer, till männens fördel. Tidigare studier har belyst att kvinnor har bristande tillit till sin förhandlingsförmåga och många studier har också visat att män har högre löneanspråk än kvinnor. Aktuell studie har ämnat identifiera faktorer som påverkar studenters förväntade löneanspråk för ingångslön. Resultaten här baseras på en enkätundersökning besvarad av 137 ingenjörsstudenter. Studiens resultat bekräftar tidigare studiers gällande mäns och kvinnors löneanspråk och förhandlingsförmåga, män anger högre värden för båda dessa variabler. Studien har kunnat synliggöra avgörande faktorer för studenters löneanspråk. Starkast prediktor för deltagarnas förväntade löneanspråk är variablerna kön, examensgrad och ålder. Könskillnader diskuteras för dessa resultat.

Following the booming of global e-business, the demand for online negotiations is growing apparently. Recently, instant messaging (IM) software such as Microsoft MSN, Yahoo messenger has become very popular synchronous communication tool. Although the instant messaging tools make people can negotiate or communicate with each other synchronously over the Internet, in terms of the richness of communication media, instant messaging is leaner than that of traditional face-to-face. Previous studies have demonstrated that the media richness of communication has effect on negotiation behavior and result. To improve the richness of the instant messaging, many instant messaging tools have provided a variety of emoticons for user. Due to the popularity of instant messaging and emoticon usage, the purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of emoticons on synchronous e-negotiation environment. In this study, we conducted a lab experiment to simulate synchronous negotiations. The findings reveal that emoticons have effects on negotiation process and negotiators¡¦ communication ability.

The Internet has become one of the indispensable approaches to information exchange and acquisition in the daily lives of people in most of the world. The emerging Internet and vigorous development of information technology in the recent years have brought us a more convenient and reliable means to access information. With the rapid information transmission, it not only changes the traditional social mode of operations, but also enables immediate commercial activities on the Internet. The development of e-negotiation systems benefit the enterprises in the competitive global environments for saving financial and time costs in travels, transportations and accommodations, as well as assists international negotiators to negotiate with counterparts more efficiently, with no time difference and no boundaries in the global village of e-commerce. While Internet and Information technologies breaking the spaces and limitations in terms of geography, the international negotiators have to break the habits of using native language instead and using the world language ¡V English ¡V to negotiate with their counterparts from different backgrounds and countries with various native languages spoken. Languages and communication are the most important elements in the negotiation, and they affect the success of negotiation processes and outcomes. This research is to explore the impact of language familiarity on negotiators and negotiation strategies, an asynchronous e-negotiation system was developed accordingly and experiments conducted in the groups of native language (Mandarin) and non-native language (English). Research results showed that negotiators who negotiated with native language had higher self-efficacy than the group with non-native language. The language self-efficacy showed significant positive influences on communication efficiency, but revealed negative impact on the relation with anxiety. The findings also indicated that communication efficiency showed statistically positive significance in all the three strategies adapted in this research ¡V Contending strategy, Problem-Solving strategy, and Persuasive strategy. The higher the communication efficiency, the more positively it would impact on the strategies of contending, problem-solving and persuasive. As for anxiety, the results indicated that negotiators with higher anxiety would tend to use contending strategy more, but with no obvious impacts on the relations between anxiety vs. problem-solving, and anxiety vs. persuasive.

Assessing ecological sustainability involves monitoring of indicators and comparison of their states with performance targets that are deemed sustainable. First, a normative model was developed centered on evidence-based knowledge about (a) forest composition, structure, and function at multiple scales, and (b) performance targets derived by quantifying the habitat amount in naturally dynamic forests, and as required for presence of populations of specialized focal species. Second, we compared the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification standards’ ecological indicators from 1998 and 2010 in Sweden to the normative model using a Specific, Measurable, Accurate, Realistic, and Timebound (SMART) indicator approach. Indicator variables and targets for riparian and aquatic ecosystems were clearly under-represented compared to terrestrial ones. FSC’s ecological indicators expanded over time from composition and structure towards function, and from finer to coarser spatial scales. However, SMART indicators were few. Moreover, they poorly reflected quantitative evidence-based knowledge, a consequence of the fact that forest certification mirrors the outcome of a complex social negotiation process.

This study analyzes the impact of self-esteem (high vs. low), situational characterization ("negotiate" vs. "ask"), and gender (men vs. women) on the likelihood an individual initiates negotiation (n = 140). Self-esteem was primed with a prompt and the participants were told they could either "negotiate" or "ask" for more money after completing two tasks. A main effect of situational characterization was found such that negotiation was more likely in the "negotiate" condition than in the "ask" condition. Neither self-esteem nor gender produced significant results. A significant interaction showed that men were more likely to negotiate in the "ask" condition, but there were no gender differences in the "negotiate" condition. Finally, gender differences in anticipated future earnings were found. Men held considerably higher expectations for average salary 5 years after graduating from college than women. These results have important implications for training students to negotiate for the salaries they deserve and moving closer to closing the gender wage gap.

Abstract The modeling and analysis of multilateral negotiations are studied under the assumption that reaching an agreement is the main objective of the negotiators. A new methodology and associated definitions are proposed to predict the outcomes of such negotiations. The general objective of the new methodology is to study movements from one state to another in multilateral negotiations, to predict stable agreements, and to study their properties. The assumptions that the set of possible agreements is discrete and specified in advance make the negotiation problems considered here distinctive. Each decision maker has two concerns: first, achieving an alternative that is as preferable as possible; second, building support for this alternative among the other decision makers. In summary, this research consists of a systematic investigation of multilateral negotiations with the following general characteristics: • Decision makers in the negotiation seek a resolution that is not only feasible but also stable (enduring). Of course, each negotiator tries to attain the most preferable agreement for himself or herself. • If an agreement is reached, it must be an alternative from a pre-specified list, and all of the decision makers must accept the agreement. • Decision makers can possess different levels of power (or legitimacy) in support of an agreement, so the negotiation is not necessarily symmetric. Moreover, the analysis makes use of the decision makers’ preference orders over the proposed alternatives only, and does not require cardinal representations of their preferences. New concepts including State, Acceptability, Feasibility, Stability, and Fallback Distance are defined to pave the way for the proposed methodology. It is based on four types of movements, from unstable states toward stable ones, including preferential improvement, agglomeration, disloyalty move, and strategic disimprovement. Some criteria and algorithms are proposed to measure the likelihood of different moves and different outcomes. An important theorem shows that all four types of movement are mutually exclusive. The evolution of a negotiation from its status quo to the most likely outcomes is illustrated, using a tree. Several applications demonstrate that the proposed methodology can be applied to identify the most likely outcomes of a multilateral negotiation. Sensitivity analyses can be applied in several different ways to assess whether sudden or unforeseen changes in the model affect the conclusions. Several methods can be used from the literature for predicting the outcome of a negotiation. Social Choice Rules, Fallback Bargaining Procedures, and Bankruptcy Solutions are applied to the current negotiations over the legal status of the Caspian Sea to predict or recommend the most appropriate resolution among the proposed alternatives. In addition, the applicability of Graph Model for Conflict Resolution and its associated decision support system (DSS), GMCR II, are briefly discussed. Reasons why these methods are not appropriate when reaching an agreement is the main objective of decision makers (DMs) are then put forward. Based on the conceptual model for multilateral negotiations proposed in this thesis, a practical Negotiation Support System (NSS) is designed and implemented in Microsoft Access using Microsoft Visual Basic. This NSS increases the speed and accuracy of calculations. In the output of this NSS, all movements from initial states to subsequent states and their associated likelihoods are clearly illustrated, and all stable agreements are distinguished. Two real-world multilateral negotiations, over the legal status of the Caspian Sea and over the Epton site brownfield redevelopment project in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, are modeled and analyzed using the proposed methodology. To measure DMs’ weights quantitatively in the Caspian Sea negotiations, eleven criteria that can be considered to be important determinants of countries’ capabilities are discussed, evaluated, and integrated using a Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis model. The Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) method is employed to find the most favourable set of relative importance of different criteria for each country. Applying the proposed methodology indicates that unanimous agreements over the division of the Caspian Sea, either based on the International Law of the Seas or based on Soviet maps, are most likely as the enduring legal status of the Caspian Sea. The objective of applying the proposed methodology to actual negotiations over the redevelopment of a brownfield project is to ensure that the new methodology is flexible enough to model more real-world cases. Moreover, we wanted to test how well the actual outcomes of the real world negotiations match the most likely outcomes identified by the methodology. The results show that the decisions on the use of the Epton site followed the most likely path described and predicted by the model. This thesis is multidisciplinary in nature. It utilizes different branches of knowledge, including applied mathematics (game theory), computer science and programming, international relations, and environmental management. However, negotiation modeling and analysis in this thesis is developed from a systems engineering perspective.

An innovative negotiation framework for resolving complex construction conflicts and disputes has been developed in this research. The unique feature of the proposed negotiation framework is that it takes into account the attitudes of the decision makers, which is an important human factor in construction negotiation at both the strategic and tactical levels of decision making. At the strategic level, the Graph Model for Conflict Resolution (GMCR) technique has been systematically employed as a method of determining the most beneficial strategic agreement that is possible, given the competing interests and attitudes of the decision makers. At the tactical level, a previously agreed-upon strategic decision has been analyzed in depth using utility functions in order to determine the trade-offs or concessions needed for the decision makers to reach a mutually acceptable resolution of the negotiation issues. A real-life case study of a brownfield construction negotiation has been used to illustrate how the proposed methodology can be applied and to demonstrate the importance and benefits of incorporating the attitudes of the decision makers into the negotiation process to better identify the most feasible resolutions. The proposed attitude-based negotiation framework constitutes a new systems engineering methodology that will assist managers in tackling real-world controversies, particularly in the construction industry. The negotiation framework has been implemented into a convenient negotiation decision support system that automates the proposed negotiation methodology. The research is expected to improve negotiation methodologies for construction disputes, thereby saving significant amounts of time and resources. The proposed methodology may also assist decision makers in overcoming the challenges of conventional negotiation processes because the incorporation of the attitudes of the decision makers results in a more accurate identification of tradeoffs, greater recognition of the level of satisfaction of the decision makers, and enhanced generation of optimum solutions.

In the past decade, electronic negotiation has become an important research topic in the field of information systems. A desirable goal of negotiation agents is to understand their owners' requirements, and to learn their opponents' behavior, thereby lessening the involvement of human beings. Studies on human negotiation bring out that several issues can affect a human's negotiation behavior, including learning an opponent's behavior, exerting power on an opponent, and setting an individual goal to improve the level of accomplishment. Research on incorporating these issues into negotiation agents is, however, still at an infancy state. We therefore take up this topic in this thesis. Researchers have proposed many different negotiation agents that follow a preset behavior based on human models of negotiation. In this thesis, we consider one such model, known as the time-dependent-tactical model, which is used by human negotiators and in which the values of the negotiating issues are determined based on the time elapsed in the negotiation. A learning mechanism for this model might be beneficial, because this model is frequently used in electronic negotiation. Thus, we propose heuristic algorithms that estimate the parameters of an agent's time-dependent-tactical model, and that then react to the estimated parameters for achieving higher negotiation performance. Besides learning, we incorporate two other factors that have been found to affect a human negotiation outcome. These are situational power, which represents differences in negotiators' status based on market conditions, and goal constraints, which stand for the levels of accomplishment negotiators try to strive for. To validate the impacts of learning, situational power and goal constraints in electronic negotiation, we first present how to integrate these features into negotiation agents, and then conduct simulations. With 187,500 simulation runs, we observe that our learning algorithms are effective in improving both individual and dyadic negotiation performances. For the effects of situational power and goal constraints, we obtain congruent results between human and electronic negotiations. By incorporating learning into situational power and goal constraints, we achieve significant joint effect between learning and situational power as well as that between learning and goal constraints. In summary, this thesis provides three primary contributions to the fields of information systems and electronic-commerce research. First, we have designed algorithms for learning an opponent's negotiation behavior. Second, our learning algorithms are found to be effective in improving negotiation performance. Third, we have shown how learning can be integrated with situational power and goal constraints, although this is not a major focus in this study. Finally, the agreement on the joint effects of learning, situational power and goal constraints between human and electronic negotiations suggests that our integrated design of the agent appears to be effective.