Wasonian Persuasion

Kfir Eliaz and Ariel Rubinstein

No 20907, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: A firm wishes to persuade a patient to take a drug by making either positive statements like "if you take our drug, you will be cured", or negative statements like "anyone who was not cured did not take our drug". Patients are neither Bayesian nor strategic: They use a decision procedure based on sampling past cases. We characterize the firm's optimal statement, and analyze competition between firms making either positive statements about themselves or negative statements about their rivals. The model highlights that logically equivalent statements can differ in effectiveness and identifies circumstances favoring negative ads over positive ones.

Keywords: Persuasion; Non-bayesian behaviour; Narratives (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D83 D91 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025-12
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