IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/popmgt/v29y2020i11p2579-2600.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How Decision Complexity Affects Outcomes in Combinatorial Auctions

Author

Listed:
  • Gediminas Adomavicius
  • Shawn P. Curley
  • Alok Gupta
  • Pallab Sanyal

Abstract

Procurement mechanisms used by businesses have evolved from simple single‐item auctions to complex multi‐unit, multi‐attribute, and multi‐object auctions and their combinations. These state‐of‐the‐art mechanisms offer many economic benefits but also introduce challenges such as the increased complexity in decision‐making for the participants. Our primary goal in this study is to study how decision complexity affects the economic outcomes and acceptability of an advanced economic mechanism: the continuous combinatorial auction. We identify three aspects of complexity—auction size, competition, and the number of active bids. We examine these complexity aspects with five types of auctions conducted with a general consumer population in an experimental environment with real payoffs. We find that various aspects of complexity affect economic outcomes in different ways. Furthermore, competition is a critical factor for conducting efficient auctions. We also conduct a secondary analysis of bidder behavior through a granular examination of clickstream data collected during the auctions. We find that decision complexity influences bidder strategies leading to differences in auction outcomes. Based on our analysis, we develop valuable insights for auction practitioners.

Suggested Citation

  • Gediminas Adomavicius & Shawn P. Curley & Alok Gupta & Pallab Sanyal, 2020. "How Decision Complexity Affects Outcomes in Combinatorial Auctions," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 29(11), pages 2579-2600, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:popmgt:v:29:y:2020:i:11:p:2579-2600
    DOI: 10.1111/poms.13249
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/poms.13249
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/poms.13249?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gediminas Adomavicius & Shawn P. Curley & Alok Gupta & Pallab Sanyal, 2012. "Effect of Information Feedback on Bidder Behavior in Continuous Combinatorial Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(4), pages 811-830, April.
    2. Peter Cramton, 2013. "Spectrum Auction Design," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 42(2), pages 161-190, March.
    3. Anthony M. Kwasnica & John O. Ledyard & Dave Porter & Christine DeMartini, 2005. "A New and Improved Design for Multiobject Iterative Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(3), pages 419-434, March.
    4. Martin Bichler & Zhen Hao & Gediminas Adomavicius, 2017. "Coalition-Based Pricing in Ascending Combinatorial Auctions," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 28(1), pages 159-179, March.
    5. F. Bonomo & J. Catalán & G. Durán & R. Epstein & M. Guajardo & A. Jawtuschenko & J. Marenco, 2017. "An asymmetric multi-item auction with quantity discounts applied to Internet service procurement in Buenos Aires public schools," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 258(2), pages 569-585, November.
    6. Ravi Bapna & Paulo Goes & Alok Gupta, 2003. "Replicating Online Yankee Auctions to Analyze Auctioneers' and Bidders' Strategies," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 14(3), pages 244-268, September.
    7. Wei Chen & Milind Dawande & Ganesh Janakiraman, 2018. "Optimal Procurement Auctions Under Multistage Supplier Qualification," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 20(3), pages 566-582, July.
    8. Jay Simon & Francois Melese, 2011. "A Multiattribute Sealed-Bid Procurement Auction with Multiple Budgets for Government Vendor Selection," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 8(3), pages 170-179, September.
    9. Goeree, Jacob K. & Holt, Charles A., 2010. "Hierarchical package bidding: A paper & pencil combinatorial auction," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 146-169, September.
    10. Bonner, Sarah E., 1994. "A model of the effects of audit task complexity," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 19(3), pages 213-234, April.
    11. Jason Shachat & J. Todd Swarthout, 2010. "Procurement Auctions for Differentiated Goods," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 7(1), pages 6-22, March.
    12. Campbell, Donald J. & Gingrich, Karl F., 1986. "The interactive effects of task complexity and participation on task performance: A field experiment," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 162-180, October.
    13. Gediminas Adomavicius & Alok Gupta, 2005. "Toward Comprehensive Real-Time Bidder Support in Iterative Combinatorial Auctions," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 16(2), pages 169-185, June.
    14. Jessica L. Barker & Pat Barclay & H. Kern Reeve, 2012. "Within-group competition reduces cooperation and payoffs in human groups," Behavioral Ecology, International Society for Behavioral Ecology, vol. 23(4), pages 735-741.
    15. Michael H. Rothkopf & Aleksandar Pekev{c} & Ronald M. Harstad, 1998. "Computationally Manageable Combinational Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 44(8), pages 1131-1147, August.
    16. Gail Hohner & John Rich & Ed Ng & Grant Reid & Andrew J. Davenport & Jayant R. Kalagnanam & Ho Soo Lee & Chae An, 2003. "Combinatorial and Quantity-Discount Procurement Auctions Benefit Mars, Incorporated and Its Suppliers," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 33(1), pages 23-35, February.
    17. Wedad J. Elmaghraby & Elena Katok & Natalia Santamaría, 2012. "A Laboratory Investigation of Rank Feedback in Procurement Auctions," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 14(1), pages 128-144, January.
    18. Wood, Robert E., 1986. "Task complexity: Definition of the construct," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 60-82, February.
    19. Marcelo Olivares & Gabriel Y. Weintraub & Rafael Epstein & Daniel Yung, 2012. "Combinatorial Auctions for Procurement: An Empirical Study of the Chilean School Meals Auction," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(8), pages 1458-1481, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Martin Bichler & Johannes Knörr & Felipe Maldonado, 2023. "Pricing in Nonconvex Markets: How to Price Electricity in the Presence of Demand Response," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 34(2), pages 652-675, June.
    2. Abhishek Ray & Mario Ventresca & Karthik Kannan, 2021. "A Graph-Based Ant Algorithm for the Winner Determination Problem in Combinatorial Auctions," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 32(4), pages 1099-1114, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gediminas Adomavicius & Alok Gupta & Mochen Yang, 2022. "Bidder Support in Multi-item Multi-unit Continuous Combinatorial Auctions: A Unifying Theoretical Framework," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 33(4), pages 1174-1195, December.
    2. Pallab Sanyal, 2016. "Characteristics and Economic Consequences of Jump Bids in Combinatorial Auctions," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(2), pages 347-364, June.
    3. Kemal Guler & Martin Bichler & Ioannis Petrakis, 2016. "Ascending Combinatorial Auctions with Risk Averse Bidders," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 25(3), pages 609-639, May.
    4. Kaplan, Todd R. & Zamir, Shmuel, 2015. "Advances in Auctions," Handbook of Game Theory with Economic Applications,, Elsevier.
    5. Bart Vangerven & Dries R. Goossens & Frits C. R. Spieksma, 2021. "Using Feedback to Mitigate Coordination and Threshold Problems in Iterative Combinatorial Auctions," Business & Information Systems Engineering: The International Journal of WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK, Springer;Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (GI), vol. 63(2), pages 113-127, April.
    6. Gediminas Adomavicius & Shawn P. Curley & Alok Gupta & Pallab Sanyal, 2012. "Effect of Information Feedback on Bidder Behavior in Continuous Combinatorial Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(4), pages 811-830, April.
    7. Heczko, Alexander & Kittsteiner, Thomas & Ott, Marion, 2018. "The Performance of Core-Selecting Auctions: An Experiment," EconStor Preprints 176842, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    8. Soumyakanti Chakraborty & Anup K. Sen & Amitava Bagchi, 2015. "Addressing the valuation problem in multi-round combinatorial auctions," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 17(5), pages 1145-1160, October.
    9. Kevin Leyton-Brown & Paul Milgrom & Neil Newman & Ilya Segal, 2023. "Artificial Intelligence and Market Design: Lessons Learned from Radio Spectrum Reallocation," NBER Chapters, in: New Directions in Market Design, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Kursad Derinkuyu & Fehmi Tanrisever & Nermin Kurt & Gokhan Ceyhan, 2020. "Optimizing Day-Ahead Electricity Market Prices: Increasing the Total Surplus for Energy Exchange Istanbul," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 22(4), pages 700-716, July.
    11. Vangerven, Bart & Goossens, Dries R. & Spieksma, Frits C.R., 2017. "Winner determination in geometrical combinatorial auctions," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 258(1), pages 254-263.
    12. Andor Goetzendorff & Martin Bichler & Pasha Shabalin & Robert W. Day, 2015. "Compact Bid Languages and Core Pricing in Large Multi-item Auctions," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(7), pages 1684-1703, July.
    13. Munro, David R. & Rassenti, Stephen J., 2019. "Combinatorial clock auctions: Price direction and performance," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 195-217.
    14. Larson, Nathan & Elmaghraby, Wedad, 2008. "Procurement auctions with avoidable fixed costs: an experimental approach," MPRA Paper 32163, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2011.
    15. G. Anandalingam & Robert W. Day & S. Raghavan, 2005. "The Landscape of Electronic Market Design," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(3), pages 316-327, March.
    16. Avenali, Alessandro, 2009. "Exploring the VCG mechanism in combinatorial auctions: The threshold revenue and the threshold-price rule," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 199(1), pages 262-275, November.
    17. Jawad Abrache & Teodor Crainic & Michel Gendreau & Monia Rekik, 2007. "Combinatorial auctions," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 153(1), pages 131-164, September.
    18. Thomas Kittsteiner & Marion Ott & Richard Steinberg, 2022. "Competing Combinatorial Auctions," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 33(4), pages 1130-1137, December.
    19. Marcelo Olivares & Gabriel Y. Weintraub & Rafael Epstein & Daniel Yung, 2012. "Combinatorial Auctions for Procurement: An Empirical Study of the Chilean School Meals Auction," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(8), pages 1458-1481, August.
    20. Martin Bichler & Alexander Hammerl & Thayer Morrill & Stefan Waldherr, 2021. "How to Assign Scarce Resources Without Money: Designing Information Systems that are Efficient, Truthful, and (Pretty) Fair," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 32(2), pages 335-355, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:popmgt:v:29:y:2020:i:11:p:2579-2600. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1937-5956 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.