When and Why? A Critical Survey on Coordination Failure in the Laboratory

Giovanna Devetag and Andreas Ortmann

CERGE-EI Working Papers from The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economics Institute, Prague

Abstract: Coordination games with Pareto-ranked equilibria have attracted major theoretical attention over the past two decades. Two early path-breaking sets of experimental studies were widely interpreted as suggesting that coordination failure is a common phenomenon in the laboratory. We identify the major determinants that seem to affect the incidence, and/or emergence, of coordination failure in the lab and review critically the existing experimental studies on coordination games with Pareto-ranked equilibria since that early evidence emerged. We conclude that coordination failure is likely to be the exception rather than the rule, both in the lab and outside of it.

Keywords: Coordination games; Pareto-ranked equilibria; Payoff-asymmetric equilibria; Stag-hunt games; Optimization incentives; Robustness; Coordination; Coordination failure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C72 C92 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-cdm, nep-exp and nep-gth
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Related works:
Journal Article: When and why? A critical survey on coordination failure in the laboratory (2007)
Working Paper: When and Why? A Critical Survey on Coordination Failure in the Laboratory (2006)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cer:papers:wp302

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