Identification of Static and Dynamic Games of Incomplete Information with Multiple Equilibria in the Data

Author(s):  
Arvind Magesan
2012 ◽  
pp. 204-250
Author(s):  
Nolan McCarty ◽  
Adam Meirowitz

Author(s):  
Frank C. Zagare ◽  
Branislav L. Slantchev

Game theory is the science of interactive decision making. It has been used in the field of international relations (IR) for over 50 years. Almost all of the early applications of game theory in international relations drew upon the theory of zero-sum games, but the first generation of applications was also developed during the most intense period of the Cold War. The theoretical foundations for the second wave of the game theory literature in international relations were laid by a mathematician, John Nash, a co-recipient of the 1994 Nobel Prize in economics. His major achievement was to generalize the minimax solution which emerged from the first wave. The result is the now famous Nash equilibrium—the accepted measure of rational behavior in strategic form games. During the third wave, from roughly the early to mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, there was a distinct move away from static strategic form games toward dynamic games depicted in extensive form. The assumption of complete information also fell by the wayside; games of incomplete information became the norm. Technical refinements of Nash’s equilibrium concept both encouraged and facilitated these important developments. In the fourth and final wave, which can be dated, roughly, from around the middle of the 1990s, extensive form games of incomplete information appeared regularly in the strategic literature. The fourth wave is a period in which game theory was no longer considered a niche methodology, having finally emerged as a mainstream theoretical tool.


2003 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierpaolo Battigalli ◽  
Marciano Siniscalchi

We analyze a family of extensive-form solution procedures for games with incomplete information that do not require the specification of an epistemic type space a la Harsanyi, but can accommodate a (commonly known) collection of explicit restrictions D on first-order beliefs. For any fixed D we obtain a solution called D-rationalizability.In static games, D-rationalizability characterizes the set of outcomes (combinations of payoff types and strategies) that may occur in any Bayesian equilibrium model consistent with D; these are precisely the outcomes consistent with common certainty of rationality and of the restrictions D. Hence, our approach to the analysis of incomplete-information games is consistent with Harsanyi's, and it may be viewed as capturing the robust implications of Bayesian equilibrium analysis.In dynamic games, D-rationalizability yields a forward-induction refinement of this set of Bayesian equilibrium outcomes. Focusing on the restriction that first-order beliefs be consistent with a given distribution on terminal nodes, we obtain a refinement of self-confirming equilibrium. In signalling games, this refinement coincides with the Iterated Intuitive Criterion.


2001 ◽  
Vol 91 (5) ◽  
pp. 1402-1422 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacob K Goeree ◽  
Charles A Holt

This paper reports laboratory data for games that are played only once. These games span the standard categories: static and dynamic games with complete and incomplete information. For each game, the treasure is a treatment in which behavior conforms nicely to predictions of the Nash equilibrium or relevant refinement. In each case, however, a change in the payoff structure produces a large inconsistency between theoretical predictions and observed behavior. These contradictions are generally consistent with simple intuition based on the interaction of payoff asymmetries and noisy introspection about others' decisions. (JEL C72, C92)


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