The paper presents a simple game-theoretic model in which players decide on search procedures for a prize located in one of a set of labeled boxes. The prize is awarded to the player who finds it first. A player can decide on the number of (costly) search units he employs and on the order in which he conducts the search. It is shown that in equilibrium, the players employ an equal number of sea...

Decision making of agents who are members of a society is analyzed from the point of view of quantum decision theory. This generalizes the approach, developed earlier by the authors for separate individuals, to decision making under the influence of social interactions. The generalized approach not only avoids paradoxes, typical of classical decision making based on utility theory, but also exp...

The paper studies a repeated contest when contestants are uncertain about their true relative abilities. When ability and effort are complements, a favorable belief about one’s own ability stimulates effort and increases the likelihood of success. Success, in turn, reinforces favorable beliefs. We show that this implies that with positive probability players fail to learn their true relative ab...

While theory suggests that information programs may correct market failures and improve welfare, the empirical impacts of these policies remain undetermined. We show that mandatory disclosure programs in the electricity industry achieve stated policy goals. We find that the proportion of fossil fuels decreases, and the proportion of clean fuels increases in response to disclosure programs. Howe...

Adaptive learning and a fairness motive we call ‘‘punishment’’ are the basis for two prominent and substantially different types of theories of ultimatum bargaining behavior. We compare adaptive learning and fairness in an experiment that involves punishment and reward versions of the ultimatum game. We draw conclusions concerning the abilities and limitations of both types of theories. The res...

Forward-looking monetary models with Taylor-type interest rate rules are known to generate indeterminacies, with a potential dependence on extraneous “sunspots,” for some structural and policy parameters. We investigate the stability of these solutions under adaptive learning, focusing on “common factor” or “resonant frequency” representations in which the observed sunspot has a suitable time-s...

This paper studies a model of strategic communication by an informed and upwardly biased sender to one or more receivers. Applications include situations in which (i) it is costly for the sender to misrepresent information, due to legal, technological, or moral constraints, or (ii) receivers may be credulous and blindly believe the sender’s recommendation. In contrast to the predictions obtaine...

Many lament that weak accountability and poor governance impede economic development in Africa. Politicians rely on ethnic allegiances that deliver the vote irrespective of performance, dampening electoral incentives. Giving voters information about candidate competence counters ethnic loyalty and strengthens accountability. I extend a canonical electoral model to show how information provision...

There is evidence that bidders fall prey to the winner’s curse because they fail to extract information from hypothetical events like winning an auction. This paper investigates experimentally whether bidders in a common value auction perform better when the requirements for this cognitive issue also denoted by contingent reasoning are relaxed, leaving all other parameters unchanged. The overal...

This paper examines the convergence of payoffs and strategies in Erev and Roth’s model of reinforcement learning.When all players use this rule it eliminates iteratively dominated strategies and in two-person constant-sum games average payoffs converge to the value of the game. Strategies converge in constant-sum games with unique equilibria if they are pure or if they are mixed and the game is...