IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/gamebe/v136y2022icp340-359.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Link investment substitutability: A factor influencing network formation

Author

Listed:
  • Ding, Sihua

Abstract

Studies on network formation employ rather different assumptions on link formation and make different predictions. We propose a constant elasticity of substitution (CES) link formation specification that generalizes commonly used link formation assumptions and parametrizes a factor that could affect network formation, namely, link investment substitutability (LIS). We apply this approach to the model by Galeotti and Goyal (2010) that studies public good provision on an endogenously formed network and find that results on equilibria differ significantly depending on whether link investments are substitutes or complements. Additionally, when link investments are complements, we find that LIS governs the unequalness of equilibrium structures. We also explore how LIS influences the relationship between the public good provision of a player and her utility.

Suggested Citation

  • Ding, Sihua, 2022. "Link investment substitutability: A factor influencing network formation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 340-359.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:136:y:2022:i:c:p:340-359
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2022.10.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S089982562200135X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.geb.2022.10.001?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gilles, Robert P. & Chakrabarti, Subhadip & Sarangi, Sudipta, 2012. "Nash equilibria of network formation games under consent," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 159-165.
    2. Page Jr., Frank H. & Wooders, Myrna, 2009. "Strategic basins of attraction, the path dominance core, and network formation games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 462-487, May.
    3. Norma Olaizola & Federico Valenciano, 2018. "A unifying model of strategic network formation," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 47(4), pages 1033-1063, November.
    4. Daron Acemoglu & Vasco M. Carvalho & Asuman Ozdaglar & Alireza Tahbaz‐Salehi, 2012. "The Network Origins of Aggregate Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(5), pages 1977-2016, September.
    5. Sanjeev Goyal, 2007. "Introduction to Connections: An Introduction to the Economics of Networks," Introductory Chapters, in: Connections: An Introduction to the Economics of Networks, Princeton University Press.
    6. S. Redner, 1998. "How popular is your paper? An empirical study of the citation distribution," The European Physical Journal B: Condensed Matter and Complex Systems, Springer;EDP Sciences, vol. 4(2), pages 131-134, July.
    7. Dasaratha, Krishna, 2020. "Distributions of centrality on networks," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 1-27.
    8. Jackson, Matthew O. & Wolinsky, Asher, 1996. "A Strategic Model of Social and Economic Networks," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 44-74, October.
    9. Margherita Comola & Marcel Fafchamps, 2014. "Testing Unilateral and Bilateral Link Formation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 124(579), pages 954-976, September.
    10. Bloch, Francis & Dutta, Bhaskar, 2009. "Communication networks with endogenous link strength," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 39-56, May.
    11. Hojman, Daniel A. & Szeidl, Adam, 2008. "Core and periphery in networks," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 295-309, March.
    12. Bloch, Francis & Jackson, Matthew O., 2007. "The formation of networks with transfers among players," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 133(1), pages 83-110, March.
    13. ,, 2015. "Social activity and network formation," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(2), May.
    14. Anna D. Broido & Aaron Clauset, 2019. "Scale-free networks are rare," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 10(1), pages 1-10, December.
    15. Markus Kinateder & Luca Paolo Merlino, 2017. "Public Goods in Endogenous Networks," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 187-212, August.
    16. Goyal, Sanjeev & Vega-Redondo, Fernando, 2005. "Network formation and social coordination," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 178-207, February.
    17. Kinateder, Markus & Merlino, Luca Paolo, 2022. "Local public goods with weighted link formation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 316-327.
    18. Venkatesh Bala & Sanjeev Goyal, 2000. "A Noncooperative Model of Network Formation," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 68(5), pages 1181-1230, September.
    19. Réka Albert & Hawoong Jeong & Albert-László Barabási, 2000. "Error and attack tolerance of complex networks," Nature, Nature, vol. 406(6794), pages 378-382, July.
    20. Masahiko Aoki, 2013. "Horizontal vs. Vertical Information Structure of the Firm," Chapters, in: Comparative Institutional Analysis, chapter 5, pages 57-58, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    21. Jackson Matthew O. & Rogers Brian W., 2007. "Relating Network Structure to Diffusion Properties through Stochastic Dominance," The B.E. Journal of Theoretical Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-16, February.
    22. Andrea Galeotti & Sanjeev Goyal, 2010. "The Law of the Few," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(4), pages 1468-1492, September.
    23. Sanjeev Goyal & Sumit Joshi, 2006. "Unequal connections," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 34(3), pages 319-349, October.
    24. Baumann, Leonie, 2021. "A model of weighted network formation," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 16(1), January.
    25. Cabrales, Antonio & Calvó-Armengol, Antoni & Zenou, Yves, 2011. "Social interactions and spillovers," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 339-360, June.
    26. Hiller, Timo, 2017. "Peer effects in endogenous networks," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 349-367.
    27. Matthew Elliott, 2015. "Inefficiencies in Networked Markets," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 43-82, November.
    28. Bramoulle, Yann & Kranton, Rachel, 2007. "Public goods in networks," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 478-494, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Kinateder, Markus & Merlino, Luca Paolo, 2022. "Local public goods with weighted link formation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 316-327.
    2. Jackson, Matthew O. & Zenou, Yves, 2015. "Games on Networks," Handbook of Game Theory with Economic Applications,, Elsevier.
    3. Boris van Leeuwen & Theo Offerman & Arthur Schram, 2020. "Competition for Status Creates Superstars: an Experiment on Public Good Provision and Network Formation," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 18(2), pages 666-707.
    4. Gao Hongwei & Qiao Han & Sedakov Artem & Wang Lei, 2015. "A Dynamic Formation Procedure of Information Flow Networks," Journal of Systems Science and Information, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2), pages 97-110, April.
    5. Dev, Pritha, 2010. "Choosing `Me' and `My Friends': Identity in a Non-Cooperative Network Formation Game with Cost Sharing," MPRA Paper 21631, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Alan Griffith, 2022. "A continuous model of strong and weak ties," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 24(6), pages 1519-1563, December.
    7. Joost Vandenbossche & Thomas Demuynck, 2013. "Network Formation with Heterogeneous Agents and Absolute Friction," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 42(1), pages 23-45, June.
    8. Sanjeev Goyal, 2015. "Networks in Economics: A Perspective on the Literature," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1548, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    9. Norma Olaizola & Federico Valenciano, 2020. "Characterization of efficient networks in a generalized connections model with endogenous link strength," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 11(3), pages 341-367, September.
    10. Olaizola, Norma & Valenciano, Federico, 2015. "Unilateral vs. bilateral link-formation: A transition without decay," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 13-28.
    11. Kinateder, Markus & Merlino, Luca Paolo, 2023. "Free riding in networks," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    12. Markus Kinateder & Luca Paolo Merlino, 2021. "The Evolution of Networks and Local Public Good Provision: A Potential Approach," Games, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-12, July.
    13. Li, Xueheng, 2023. "Designing weighted and directed networks under complementarities," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 556-574.
    14. Norma Olaizola & Federico Valenciano, 2020. "Dominance of weighted nested split graph networks in connections models," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 49(1), pages 75-96, March.
    15. Norma Olaizola & Federico Valenciano, 2023. "A connections model with decreasing returns link-formation technology," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 14(1), pages 31-61, March.
    16. Olaizola Ortega, María Norma & Valenciano Llovera, Federico, 2016. "A Marginalist Model of Network Formation," IKERLANAK info:eu-repo/grantAgreeme, Universidad del País Vasco - Departamento de Fundamentos del Análisis Económico I.
    17. Liu, Xiaodong & Patacchini, Eleonora & Zenou, Yves & Lee, Lung-Fei, 2011. "Criminal Networks: Who is the Key Player?," Research Papers in Economics 2011:7, Stockholm University, Department of Economics.
    18. Bernard Herskovic & João Ramos, 2020. "Acquiring Information through Peers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 110(7), pages 2128-2152, July.
    19. Hellmann, Tim & Staudigl, Mathias, 2014. "Evolution of social networks," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 234(3), pages 583-596.
    20. Olaizola, Norma & Valenciano, Federico, 2014. "Asymmetric flow networks," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 237(2), pages 566-579.
      • Olaizola Ortega, María Norma & Valenciano Llovera, Federico, 2012. "Asymmetric flow networks," IKERLANAK http://www-fae1-eao1-ehu-, Universidad del País Vasco - Departamento de Fundamentos del Análisis Económico I.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Game theory; Network formation; Public good; Unequalness;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C71 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Cooperative Games
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • D85 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Network Formation
    • L14 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Transactional Relationships; Contracts and Reputation

    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:eee:gamebe:v:136:y:2022:i:c:p:340-359. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622836 .

    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.