Equivalence and Stooge Strategies in Zero-Sum Games

John Fox and Melvin Guyer
Additional contact information
John Fox: Mental Health Research Institute University of Michigan
Melvin Guyer: Mental Health Research Institute University of Michigan

Journal of Conflict Resolution, 1973, vol. 17, issue 3, 513-533

Abstract: Classes of two-person zero-sum games termed "equivalent games" are defined. These are games with identical value and identical optimal mixed-strategies but with different matrix entries and thus different opportunities for exploiting a nonrational opponent. An experiment was conducted to investigate the strategy-choice behavior of subjects playing pairs of these "equivalent games." Also investigated was the extent to which subjects would exploit a programmed stooge as a function of the degree to which the stooge departed from his optimal strategy mix. The results indicated that subjects learned to exploit the nonrational play of the stooge opponent. The game factor, on the other hand, seemed to have no significant effect upon the strategy-choice behavior of the players. The implications of these results are discussed in light of questions raised by previous research on decision-making in 2 x 2 zero-sum games.

Date: 1973
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://jcr.sagepub.com/content/17/3/513.abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:jocore:v:17:y:1973:i:3:p:513-533

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Journal of Conflict Resolution from Peace Science Society (International)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().