I apply the notion of a self‐confirming equilibrium (SCE) to study how feedback in first price auctions influences bidders' perceptions about their strategic environment, and consequently their bidding behavior. In a private values setting, revealing the two highest bids at the end of each auction is sufficient for bidders to have correct beliefs (justifying the assumption of Nash equilibrium). In contrast, in every symmetric SCE of a symmetric, affiliated, private values model, bidding strategies and revenue are (weakly) higher if only the highest bid is revealed. I also consider interdependent valuations and discuss implications for the empirical auction literature.
AbstractA search model is formulated in which positive information may be obtained, through the detection of trails, as to the target's earlier whereabouts. The corresponding Bayesian update formulas for target location probabilities are derived. The model does not appear to be amenable to rigorous optimization. A moving‐horizon rule, and a heuristic simplification thereof, are, however, derived. In two numerical examples it is demonstrated that actively designing for detecting trail information, through use of these moving‐horizon rules, has substantial potential advantage over using, for example, myopic rules even if the positive information is adaptively incorporated into location probabilities before applying the latter rules in each time period.
We experimentally investigate the effect of social identification and information feedback on individual behavior in contests. In all treatments, we find significant overexpenditure of effort relative to the standard theoretical predictions. Identifying subjects through photo display decreases wasteful effort. Providing information feedback about others' effort does not affect the aggregate effort, but it decreases the heterogeneity of effort and significantly affects the dynamics of individual behavior. A behavioral model that incorporates a nonmonetary utility of winning and relative payoff maximization explains significant overexpenditure of effort. It also suggests that decrease in "social distance" between group members through social identification promotes prosocial behavior and decreases overexpenditure of effort, while improved information feedback decreases the heterogeneity of effort.
Workers in a noisy department of a metal fabrication plant took hearing tests before and at the end of their workshifts to ascertain the extent of temporary hearing losses that occurred with and without earplugs being worn. This information was fed back to individual workers as a means for motivating greater use of ear protectors issued for hearing conservation purposes. Subsequent observations of earplug users in this department for 5 months showed a steady increase, attaining a level of 85 -90%. No more than 10% of the workers in another noisy department in the same plant, serving as a control group, wore earplugs over the same 5-month period after being given a standard lecture on hearing conservation in noise, later augmented by disciplinary threats. The effectiveness of the feedback technique in promoting earplug usage was explained as a two-stage process involving individual reinforcement, and subsequent group adoption of new norms for accepted behavior.
Based on Axelrod's adaptive culture model, the effects of the distribution of global information feedback are examined in two simulations. The first model is the generalized other model, where the most preferred features are hypothesized to represent the mental model of the most ordinary person and have the same influential power as real neighbors. The second model is the filter model, where neighbors are influential only when their traits are concordant with the most common trait among whole agents. In both simulations, the global distribution of information facilitated an earlier convergence and maintenance of cultural diversity. These counterintuitive results suggest that information about a global society, for example mass media coverage, would provide support for a local minority.
Enhancing the Effectiveness of Training through Information Feedback - The Case of Slovenia's Public Administration After the fall of the Berlin wall, the public administrations in Central and Eastern European countries have had to adapt to an enormous number of changes in a relatively short time. Their civil servants are still facing a constantly changing regulatory framework which needs implementation and enforcement, as well as new demands from the growing private sector and the citizens. These challenges can only be met if the civil servants are highly qualified and constantly updating their qualifications. A sound system of in-service training is therefore crucial to keep the public servants on equal footing with the rapidly changing environment. The research presented in this paper analyzed the practices of training evaluation as an information feedback in a branch of Slovene state administration. We analyzed the attitudes of employees towards evaluation with the assumption that there probably are notable differences between the attitudes of public servants depending on their demographic qualities. The results of the research, that 414 public servants have participated in, show that the position in the hierarchy has the strongest influence on their attitude towards evaluation. Empirical data also show that most of the employees are willing to participate in a continuous and objective training evaluation, but the leading public servants are less involved in the evaluation than expected.
