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Sensitivity of equilibrium behavior to higher-order beliefs in nice games

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  • Weinstein, Jonathan
  • Yildiz, Muhamet

Abstract

We analyze "nice" games (where action spaces are compact intervals, utilities continuous and strictly concave in own action), which are used frequently in classical economic models. Without making any "richness" assumption, we characterize the sensitivity of any given Bayesian Nash equilibrium to higher-order beliefs. That is, for each type, we characterize the set of actions that can be played in equilibrium by some type whose lower-order beliefs are all as in the original type. We show that this set is given by a local version of interim correlated rationalizability. This allows us to characterize the robust predictions of a given model under arbitrary common knowledge restrictions. We apply our framework to a Cournot game with many players. There we show that we can never robustly rule out any production level below the monopoly production of each firm.

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  • Weinstein, Jonathan & Yildiz, Muhamet, 2011. "Sensitivity of equilibrium behavior to higher-order beliefs in nice games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 288-300, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:72:y:2011:i:1:p:288-300
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    2. Antonio Penta & Peio Zuazo-Garin, 2022. "Rationalizability, Observability, and Common Knowledge [Player Importance and Forward Induction]," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 89(2), pages 948-975.
    3. Yun Wang, 2023. "Belief and higher‐order belief in the centipede games: An experimental investigation," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(1), pages 27-73, February.
    4. Yildiz, Muhamet, 2015. "Invariance to representation of information," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 142-156.
    5. ,, 2013. "On the structure of rationalizability for arbitrary spaces of uncertainty," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 8(2), May.
    6. Mariann Ollár & Antonio Penta, 2019. "Implementation via transfers with identical but unknown distributions," Economics Working Papers 1676, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    7. Catonini, Emiliano & Penta, Antonio, 2022. "Backward Induction Reasoning beyond Backward Induction," TSE Working Papers 22-1298, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    8. Chen, Yi-Chun, 2012. "A structure theorem for rationalizability in the normal form of dynamic games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 587-597.
    9. Yi-Chun Chen & Xiao Luo, 2012. "An indistinguishability result on rationalizability under general preferences," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 51(1), pages 1-12, September.
    10. Dirk Bergemann & Tibor Heumann & Stephen Morris, 2021. "Information, market power, and price volatility," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 52(1), pages 125-150, March.
    11. Chen, Yi-Chun & Takahashi, Satoru & Xiong, Siyang, 2022. "Robust refinement of rationalizability with arbitrary payoff uncertainty," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 485-504.
    12. Emiliano Catonini & Antonio Penta, 2022. "Backward Induction Reasoning beyond Backward Induction," Working Papers 1315, Barcelona School of Economics.
    13. Emiliano Cantonini & Antonio Penta, 2022. "Backward induction reasoning beyond backward induction," Economics Working Papers 1815, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.

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