Editors Trajkovski, a former professor of information technology at South U., and Collins (anthropology, Towson U.) have collected research from all over the world on the interactions of agents and multi-agent systems within societies in human, robotic and software form. Written for students and researchers in social computing, artificial intelligence and cognitive informatics, this volume covers topics such as promoting pro-social behavior through virtual learning environments, proxy agents using reinforcement learning and social transmission through partner selection. The foundations of MAS, which include the sociology of emergence, structure and agency in sociology and issues in heterogeneous societies, is explored throughout these research articles. Annotation ©2009 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)