Opponent's Actions Research Articles

Uwagi dotyczące wyrażenia WOJNA PODJAZDOWA

The word combination guerrilla war has a terminological meaning ‘war, during which the weaker side uses the tactics of avoiding general battles and combats unexpected enemy attacks with the help of small military units or partisans’. The combination guerrilla war is associated by users of common language primarily with semantic elements such as ‘a scope of insidious, hidden and difficult to predict, tiring opponent actions’. In the modern texts, the term guerrilla war can undergo a metaphorisation process – it is a determinologisation of multiword expression of military terms. In the figurative sense of the verbal connection guerrilla war there are characterised semantic elements as ‘set of insidious actions, hidden, difficult to predict, directed against to someone or to something, to achieve something, teasing the opposite side, her fatigue, limiting its influence’. In some texts determinologisation signals were presented – a change of component pattern, clauses appeared, which indicates metaphorisation of compound, for example: tax guerrilla war, office guerrilla war. The texts which reported metaphored military term guerrilla war featured the following metaphors: POLITICS is a WAR, ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE is a WAR, DIFFERENT, SPECIAL ACTIVITIES and FORMS OF COMPETITION is a WAR.

Dopamine D1and D3Receptors Modulate Heroin-Induced Cognitive Impairment through Opponent Actions in Mice

Background:Chronic abuse of heroin leads to long-lasting and complicated cognitive impairment. Dopamine receptors are critically involved in the impulsive drug-driven behavior and the altered attention, processing speed, and mental flexibility that are associated with higher relapse rates. However, the effects of the different dopamine receptors and their possible involvement in heroin-induced cognitive impairment remain unclear.Methods:The 5-choice serial reaction time task was used to investigate the profiles of heroin-induced cognitive impairment in mice. The expression levels of dopamine D1- and D2-like receptors in the prefrontal cortex, nucleus accumbens, and caudate-putamen were determined. The effects of dopamine receptors on heroin-induced impulsivity in the 5-choice serial reaction time task were examined by agonist/antagonist treatment on D1 or D3 receptor mutant mice.Results:Systemic heroin administration influences several variables in the 5-choice serial reaction time task, most notably premature responses, a measure of motor impulsivity. These behavioral impairments are associated with increased D1 receptor and decreased D3 receptor mRNA and protein levels in 3 observed brain areas. The heroin-evoked increase in premature responses is mimicked by a D1 agonist and prevented by a D1 antagonist or genetic ablation of the D1 receptor gene. In contrast, a D3 agonist decreases both basal and heroin-evoked premature responses, while genetic ablation of the D3 receptor gene results in increased basal and heroin-evoked premature responses.Conclusions:Heroin-induced impulsive behavior in the 5-choice serial reaction time task is oppositely modulated by D1 and D3 receptor activation. The D1 receptors in the cortical-mesolimbic region play an indispensable role in modulating such behaviors.

When does restricting your opponent's freedom hurt you?

I examine the payoff consequences for a player when she removes a subset of her opponent's actions before playing a two-player complete information normal form game. When she faces a constraint on the maximal number of actions she can remove, she can be strictly better off by not removing any actions. I present such an example. I also establish sufficient conditions under which removing opponent's actions cannot hurt. As a corollary, I also characterize a necessary condition for a player's optimal Nash Equilibrium in games with generic payoffs when her opponent has strictly more actions than she does.

Adaptability of expert visual anticipation in baseball batting

ABSTRACTBy manipulating stimulus variation in terms of opponent pitcher actions, this study investigated the capability of expert (n = 30) and near-expert (n = 95) professional baseball batters to adapt anticipation skill when using the video simulation temporal occlusion paradigm. Participants watched in-game footage of two pitchers, one after the other, that was temporally occluded at ball release and various points during ball flight. They were required to make a written prediction of pitch types and locations. Per cent accuracy was calculated for pitch type, for pitch location, and for type and location combined. Results indicated that experts and near-experts could adapt their anticipation to predict above guessing level across both pitchers, but adaptation to the left-handed pitcher was poorer than the right-handed pitcher. Small-to-moderate effect sizes were found in terms of superior adaptation by experts over near-experts at the ball release and early ball flight occlusion conditions. The findings of this study extend theoretical and applied knowledge of expertise in striking sports. Practical application of the instruments and findings are discussed in terms of applied researchers, practitioners and high-performance staff in professional sporting organisations.

Predicting Opponent's Production in Real-Time Strategy Games With Answer Set Programming

The adversarial character of real-time strategy (RTS) games is one of the main sources of uncertainty within this domain. Since players lack exact knowledge about their opponent's actions, they need a reasonable representation of alternative possibilities and their likelihood. In this article we propose a method of predicting the most probable combination of units produced by the opponent during a certain time period. We employ a logic programming paradigm called Answer Set Programming, since its semantics is well suited for reasoning with uncertainty and incomplete knowledge. In contrast with typical, purely probabilistic approaches, the presented method takes into account the background knowledge about the game and only considers the combinations that are consistent with the game mechanics and with the player's partial observations. Experiments, conducted during different phases of StarCraft: Brood War and Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne games, show that the prediction accuracy for time intervals of 1–3 min seems to be surprisingly high, making the method useful in practice. Root-mean-square error grows only slowly with increasing prediction intervals—almost in a linear fashion.

When Does Restricting Your Opponent's Freedom Hurt You?

I examine the payoff consequences for a player when she removes a subset of her opponent's actions before playing a two-player complete information normal form game. When she faces a constraint on the maximal number of actions she can remove, she can be strictly better off by not removing any actions. I present such an example. I also establish sufficient conditions under which removing opponent's actions cannot hurt. As a corollary, I also characterize a necessary condition for a player's optimal Nash Equilibrium in games with generic payoffs when her opponent has strictly more actions than she does.

Instance-Based Models of Metacognition in the Prisoner's Dilemma.

In this article, we examine the advantages of simple metacognitive capabilities in a repeated social dilemma. Two types of metacognitive agent were developed and compared with a non-metacognitive agent and two fixed-strategy agents. The first type of metacognitive agent (opponent perspective) takes the perspective of the opponent to anticipate the opponent's future actions and respond accordingly. The other metacognitive agent (modeler) predicts the opponent's next move based on the previous moves of the agent and the opponent. The modeler agent achieves better individual outcomes than a non-metacognitive agent and is more successful at encouraging cooperation. The opponent-perspective agent, by contrast, fails to achieve these outcomes because it lacks important information about the opponent. These simple agents provide insights regarding modeling of metacognition in more complex tasks.

Enhancing Video Games Policy Based on Least-Squares Continuous Action Policy Iteration: Case Study on StarCraft Brood War and Glest RTS Games and the 8 Queens Board Game

With the rapid advent of video games recently and the increasing numbers of players and gamers, only a tough game with high policy, actions, and tactics survives. How the game responds to opponent actions is the key issue of popular games. Many algorithms were proposed to solve this problem such as Least-Squares Policy Iteration (LSPI) and State-Action-Reward-State-Action (SARSA) but they mainly depend on discrete actions, while agents in such a setting have to learn from the consequences of their continuous actions, in order to maximize the total reward over time. So in this paper we proposed a new algorithm based on LSPI called Least-Squares Continuous Action Policy Iteration (LSCAPI). The LSCAPI was implemented and tested on three different games: one board game, the 8 Queens, and two real-time strategy (RTS) games, StarCraft Brood War and Glest. The LSCAPI evaluation proved superiority over LSPI in time, policy learning ability, and effectiveness.

Time to broaden the scope of research on anticipatory behavior: a case for the role of probabilistic information.

Time to broaden the scope of research on anticipatory behavior: a case for the role of probabilistic information.

Pattern-induced expectation bias in visual anticipation of action outcomes

When anticipating an opponent's action intention, athletes may rely on both kinematic and contextual cues. Here we show that patterns of previous action outcomes (i.e., a contextual cue) bias visual anticipation of action outcome in subsequent trials. In two video-based experiments, skilled players and novices were presented with volleyball attacks stopping 360ms (Exp. 1) or 280ms (Exp. 2) before an attacker's hand-ball-contact and they were asked to predict the type of attack (smash or lob). Attacks were presented block-wise with six attacks per block. The fifth trial served as target trial where we presented identical attacks to control kinematic cues. We varied the outcomes of the preceding four attacks under three conditions: lobs only, smashes only or an alternating pattern of attack outcomes. In Exp. 1, skilled players but not novices were less accurate and responded later in target trials that were incongruent vs. congruent with preceding patterns. In Exp. 2, where the task was easier, another group of novices demonstrated a similar congruence effect for accuracy but not response time. Collectively, findings indicate that participants tended to preferentially expect the continuation of an attack pattern, while possibly attaching less importance to kinematic cues. Thus, overreliance on pattern continuation may be detrimental to anticipation in situations an action's outcome does not correspond to the pattern. From a methodological viewpoint, comparison of novices' performance in Exp. 1 and 2 suggests that task difficulty may be critical as to whether contextual cue effects can be identified in novices.

Does expert perceptual anticipation transfer to a dissimilar domain?

The purpose of this experiment was to extend theoretical understanding of transfer of learning by investigating whether expert perceptual anticipation skill transfers to a dissimilar domain. The capability of expert and near-expert rugby players as well as novices to anticipate skill type within rugby (learning sport) was first examined using a temporal occlusion paradigm. Participants watched video footage of an opponent performing rugby skill types that were temporally occluded at different points in the opponent's action and then made a written prediction. Thereafter, the capability of participants to transfer their anticipation skill to predict pitch type in baseball (transfer sport) was examined. Participants watched video footage of a pitcher throwing different pitch types that were temporally occluded and made a written prediction. Results indicated that expert and near-expert rugby players anticipated significantly better than novices across all occlusion conditions. However, none of the skill groups were able to transfer anticipation skill to predict pitch type in baseball. The findings of this paper, along with existing literature, support the theoretical prediction that transfer of perceptual anticipation is expertise dependent and restricted to similar domains.

Determinacy of games with Stochastic Eventual Perfect Monitoring

We consider an infinite two-player stochastic zero-sum game with a Borel winning set, in which the opponent's actions are monitored via stochastic private signals. We introduce two conditions of the signalling structure: Stochastic Eventual Perfect Monitoring (SEPM) and Weak Stochastic Eventual Perfect Monitoring (WSEPM). When signals are deterministic these two conditions coincide and by a recent result due to Shmaya (2011) entail determinacy of the game. We generalize Shmaya's (2011) result and show that in the stochastic learning environment SEPM implies determinacy while WSEPM does not.

Adding up the odds-Nitric oxide signaling underlies the decision to flee and post-conflict depression of aggression.

Fighting is dangerous, which is why animals choose to flee once the costs outweigh the benefits, but the mechanisms underlying this decision-making process are unknown. By manipulating aggressive signaling and applying nitrergic drugs, we show that the evolutionarily conserved neuromodulator nitric oxide (NO), which has a suppressing effect on aggression in mammals, can play a decisive role. We found that crickets, which exhibit spectacular fighting behavior, flee once the sum of their opponent's aversive actions accrued during fighting exceeds a critical amount. This effect of aversive experience is mediated by the NO signaling pathway. Rather than suppressing aggressive motivation, NO increases susceptibility to aversive stimuli and with it the likelihood to flee. NO's effect is manifested in losers by prolonged avoidance behavior, characteristic for social defeat in numerous species. Intriguingly, fighting experience also induces, via NO, a brief susceptible period to aversive stimuli in winners just after victory. Our findings thus reveal a key role for NO in the mechanism underlying the decision to flee and post-conflict depression in aggressive behavior.

Abstraction for Solving Large Incomplete-Information Games

Most real-world games and many recreational games are games of incomplete information. Over the last dozen years, abstraction has emerged as a key enabler for solving large incomplete-information games. First, the game is abstracted to generate a smaller, abstract game that is strategically similar to the original game. Second, an approximate equilibrium is computed in the abstract game. Third, the strategy from the abstract game is mapped back to the original game. In this paper, I will review key developments in the field. I present reasons for abstracting games, and point out the issue of abstraction pathology. I then review the practical algorithms for information abstraction and action abstraction. I then cover recent theoretical breakthroughs that beget bounds on the quality of the strategy from the abstract game, when measured in the original game. I then discuss how to reverse map the opponent's action into the abstraction if the opponent makes a move that is not in the abstraction. Finally, I discuss other topics of current and future research.

Information-Sharing Over Adaptive Networks With Self-Interested Agents

We examine the behavior of multi-agent networks where information-sharing is subject to a positive communications cost over the edges linking the agents. We consider a general mean-square-error formulation where all agents are interested in estimating the same target vector. We first show that, in the absence of any incentives to cooperate, the optimal strategy for the agents is to behave in a selfish manner with each agent seeking the optimal solution independently of the other agents. Pareto inefficiency arises as a result of the fact that agents are not using historical data to predict the behavior of their neighbors and to know whether they will reciprocate and participate in sharing information. Motivated by this observation, we develop a reputation protocol to summarize the opponent's past actions into a reputation score, which can then be used to form a belief about the opponent's subsequent actions. The reputation protocol entices agents to cooperate and turns their optimal strategy into an action-choosing strategy that enhances the overall social benefit of the network. In particular, we show that when the communications cost becomes large, the expected social benefit of the proposed protocol outperforms the social benefit that is obtained by cooperative agents that always share data. We perform a detailed mean-square-error analysis of the evolution of the network over three domains: far field, near-field, and middle-field, and show that the network behavior is stable for sufficiently small step-sizes. The various theoretical results are illustrated by numerical simulations.

Robust communications or incivility – where do we draw the line?

ABSTRACTCivility has long been considered a core value of lawyering. For some time, concern has been expressed in the literature about the loss of civility in the legal profession, and regulators and professional associations have sought to foster civility and to discourage, and in some cases, penalise, incivility. In particular, instances of incivility or discourteousness are increasingly linked to questions of misconduct. However, the notion of ‘civility’ is itself, often contentious, and the line between ‘robust' communication and incivility is unclear.Does civility matter? If so, when will lawyer advocacy on behalf of the client, or their strongly worded criticisms of an opponent's actions, become the subject of claims of unethical behaviour?Arguing that civility is important, this article will analyse relevant case law from Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada and New Zealand, in order to better understand contemporary conceptions of civility and to draw out principles currently being used to gauge the distinction between appropriate communications and unethical behaviour. The article finds a relatively high degree of consistency in the approach across jurisdictions. This suggests that there is, broadly speaking, a common understanding of the meaning and significance of lawyer civility. At the same time, there are relatively few cases that deal with lawyer incivility. This is somewhat surprising in light of the concerns around loss of civility in the profession.

The coupling between gaze behavior and opponent kinematics during anticipation of badminton shots

PurposeWe examined links between the kinematics of an opponent’s actions and the visual search behaviors of badminton players responding to those actions. MethodA kinematic analysis of international standard badminton players (n=4) was undertaken as they completed a range of serves. Video of these players serving was used to create a life-size temporal occlusion test to measure anticipation responses. Expert (n=8) and novice (n=8) badminton players anticipated serve location while wearing an eye movement registration system. ResultsDuring the execution phase of the opponent’s movement, the kinematic analysis showed between-shot differences in distance traveled and peak acceleration at the shoulder, elbow, wrist and racket. Experts were more accurate at responding to the serves compared to novice players. Expert players fixated on the kinematic locations that were most discriminating between serve types more frequently and for a longer duration compared to novice players. Moreover, players were generally more accurate at responding to serves when they fixated vision upon the discriminating arm and racket kinematics. ConclusionsFindings extend previous literature by providing empirical evidence that expert athletes’ visual search behaviors and anticipatory responses are inextricably linked to the opponent action being observed.

Fast mirroring of an opponent's action in a competitive game

Fast mirroring of an opponent's action in a competitive game

Action preferences and the anticipation of action outcomes

Skilled performers of time-constrained motor actions acquire information about the action preferences of their opponents in an effort to better anticipate the outcome of that opponent's actions. However, there is reason to doubt that knowledge of an opponent's action preferences would unequivocally influence anticipatory responses in a positive way. It is possible that overt information about an opponent's actions could distract skilled performers from using the advance kinematic information they would usually rely on to anticipate actions, particularly when the opponent performs an ‘unexpected’ action that is not in accordance with his or her previous behaviour. The aim of this study was to examine how the ability to anticipate the outcome of an opponent's actions can be influenced by exposure to the action preferences of that opponent. Two groups of skilled handball goalkeepers anticipated the direction of penalty throws performed by opponents before and after a training intervention that provided situational probability information in the form of action preferences (AP). During the training phase participants in an AP-training group anticipated the action outcomes of two throwers who had a strong preference to throw in one particular direction, whilst participants in a NP-training group viewed players who threw equally to all directions. Exposure to opponents who did have an action preference during the training phase resulted in improved anticipatory performance if the opponent continued to bias their throws towards their preferred direction, but decreased performance if the opponent did not. These findings highlight that skilled observers use information about action preferences to enhance their anticipatory ability, but that doing so can be disadvantageous when the outcomes are no longer consistent with their generated expectations.

The fashion game: Network extension of Matching Pennies

It is impossible, in general, to extend an asymmetric two-player game to networks, because there must be two populations, the row one and the column one, but we do not know how to define inner-population interactions. This is not the case for Matching Pennies, as we can interpret the row player as a conformist, who prefers to coordinate her opponent's action, while the column player can be interpreted as a rebel, who likes to anti-coordinate. Therefore we can naturally define the interaction between two conformists as the coordination game, and that between two rebels as the anti-coordination game. It turns out that the above network extension of Matching Pennies can be used to investigate the phenomenon of fashion, and thus it is named the fashion game. The fashion game possesses an obvious mixed Nash equilibrium, yet we are especially interested in pure Nash equilibrium (PNE for short), whose existence cannot be guaranteed. In this paper, we focus on the PNE testing problem, namely given an instance of the fashion game, answer whether it possesses a PNE or not. Our first result is on the negative side: PNE testing, in general, is hard. For the PNE testing problem restricted to several special structures, i.e. lines, rings, complete graphs and trees, either a simple characterization or an efficient algorithm is provided.