Three Essays on Bounded Rationality and Strategic Behavior

Abstract

The thesis consists of three papers, the first entitled Some Strategic Aspects of Private Information: An Experimental Analysis, the second entitled Comportamiento Estratégico y Manipulabilidad en los Métodos de Preferencias Declaradas para la Valoración de Bienes sin Mercado. Tres Experimentos de Laboratorio, and the third entitled Mistakes and Reciprocity Promote Cooperation in Public Good Games: An agent-based Approach._x000D_ The main objective of the thesis is to test, using experimental and simulation tools, the assumptions of perfect rationality and strategic behavior in three different contexts._x000D_ In the first study we are concerned with informational aspects of repeated games with incomplete information. The theoretical framework is relatively simple, a 2x2 game with incomplete information that is infinitely repeated. We asked if players with private information, in practice, take advantage of it (strategic behavior), and if the uninformed players can guess the game they are playing when had been revealed important information, such as the theory predicts._x000D_ In the second context, we want to test the assumption of manipulability (strategy proffness) in stated preference methods for valuing non-market goods. We designed three laboratory experiments for different formats of stated preferences: a pure referendum, a contingent valuation method and choice set with three alternatives._x000D_ The third is a context in which we propose an evolution of cooperation model in public goods, in environments in which agents have different degrees of cooperation conditional and act strategically to deciding whether to cooperate or not. Unlike other studies where the interest is to understand how emerging altruism or reciprocity, we am interested in study why cooperation can survive in such environments.

Date of Award	25 Jul 2012
Original language	English
Supervisor	Pere Riera Micaló (Director)