Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game

Antoine Terracol and Jonathan Vaksmann
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Jonathan Vaksmann: Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne

Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne from Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne

Abstract: This paper uses experimental data to examine the existence of a teaching strategy among bounded rational players. If players realize that their own actions modify their opponent's beliefs and actions, they might play certain actions to this specific end; and forego immediate payoffs if the expected payoffs if the expected payoff gain from a teaching strategy is high enough. Our results support the existence of a teaching strategy in several ways: First they show that players update their beliefs in order to take account of the reaction of their opponents to their own action. Second, we examine if players actually use a teaching strategy by playing an action that induces a poor immediate payoff but is likely to modify the opponent's behavior so that a preferable outcome might emerge in the future. We find strong evidence of such a strategy in the data and confirm this finding within a logistic model which suggests that the future expected payoff that could arise from a teaching strategy has indeed a significant impact on choice probabilities. Finally, we investigate the effective impact of a teaching strategy on achieved outcomes and find that efficient teachers can successfully use teaching in order to reach their favorite outcome at the expense of their opponents

Keywords: Game theory; teaching; beliefs; experiment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C72 C91 D83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 23 pages
Date: 2007-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-edu, nep-evo, nep-exp, nep-gth and nep-upt
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 70, (1-2), 2009, pp.54-71

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00145436 (application/pdf)
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2009.02.003

Related works:
Journal Article: Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game (2009)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game (2009)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game (2009)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game (2009)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: Learning and teaching in an experimental game (2009)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: learning and teaching in an experimental game (2007)
Working Paper: Dumbing down rational players: learning and teaching in an experimental game (2007)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mse:cesdoc:bla07017

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