Letting the good times roll: A theory of voter inference and experimental evidence
Abstract
This paper examines inference and attribution in a simple and ubiquitous strategic situation: a voter is faced with discerning whether a leader worked on his or her behalf after observing an informative, but noisy signal about the leader's performance. We characterize perfect Bayesian equilibria, quantal response equilibria (QRE), and provide a simple model of a heuristic-based approach, referred to as strategic naivete, within a wide class of such environments. We also discuss experiments conducted to examine human behavior within such an environment. While it is clear that the observed behavior is inconsistent with perfect Bayesian equilibrium, distinguishing between QRE and strategic naivete will require further work. We conclude with a discussion of the broader implications of probabilistic and/or heuristic-based attribution processes for electoral politics and political economy. Copyright Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2007Download Info
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Bibliographic Info
Article provided by Springer in its journal Public Choice.
Volume (Year): 130 (2007)
Issue (Month): 3 (March)
Pages: 293-310
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Web page: http://www.springerlink.com/link.asp?id=100332
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References listed on IDEASPlease report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
- McKelvey, Richard D. & Patty, John W., 2006. "A theory of voting in large elections," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 57(1), pages 155-180, October.
- Gautam Gowrisankaran & Matthew F. Mitchell & Andrea Moro, 2004. "Why Do Incumbent Senators Win? Evidence from a Dynamic Selection Model," NBER Working Papers 10748, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Richard Mckelvey & Thomas Palfrey, 1998. "Quantal Response Equilibria for Extensive Form Games," Experimental Economics, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 9-41, June.
- Wolfers, Justin, 2002. "Are Voters Rational? Evidence from Gubernatorial Elections," Research Papers 1730, Stanford University, Graduate School of Business.
- Scott Ashworth, 2005. "Reputational Dynamics and Political Careers," Journal of Law, Economics and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 21(2), pages 441-466, October.
- Wittman, Donald, 1989. "Why Democracies Produce Efficient Results," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(6), pages 1395-1424, December.
Citations
Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.Cited by:
- François Facchini & Mickaël Melki, 2012. "Political Ideology and Economic Growth in a Democracy : The French Experience, 1871 - 2009," Post-Print halshs-00662838, HAL.
- Potrafke, Niklas, 2009.
"Political cycles and economic performance in OECD countries: empirical evidence from 1951-2006,"
MPRA Paper
23751, University Library of Munich, Germany.
- Niklas Potrafke, 2012. "Political cycles and economic performance in OECD countries: empirical evidence from 1951–2006," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 150(1), pages 155-179, January.
- François Facchini & Mickaël Melki, 2012.
"Political Ideology and Economic Growth in a Democracy : The French Experience, 1871 - 2009,"
Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers)
halshs-00662838, HAL.
- François Facchini & Mickaël Melki, 2012. "Political Ideology and Economic Growth in a Democracy : The French Experience, 1871 - 2009," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 12003, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne.
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