Supporting conflict resolution in cooperative design systems

The author presents an implemented computational model, based on studies of human group problem solving, for supporting conflict resolution in cooperative design. This model is based on the insights that general conflict resolution expertise exists separately from domain-level design expertise, and that this expertise can be instantiated in the context of particular conflicts into specific advice for resolving these conflicts. Conflict resolution expertise consists of a taxonomy of design conflict classes and associated general advice suitable for resolving conflicts in these classes. The abstract nature of conflict resolution expertise makes it applicable to a wide variety of design domains. The author describes this conflict resolution model and provides examples of its operation from an implemented cooperative design system for local area network design that uses machine-based design agents. How this model is being extended to support and learn from collaboration of human design agents is discussed