IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_5792.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Altruistic Observational Learning

Author

Listed:
  • Christoph March
  • Anthony Ziegelmeyer

Abstract

We report two information cascade game experiments that directly test the impact of altruism on observational learning. Participants interact in two parallel sequences, the observed and the unobserved sequence. Only the actions of the observed entail informational benefits to subsequent participants. We find that observed contradict their private information significantly less often than unobserved when the monetary incentives to herd are moderately weak. Long laboratory cascades accumulate substantial public information which increases the earnings of participants. In Experiment 2, participants have better opportunities to learn about the strategies played by observed which amplifies the impact of altruism on observational learning.

Suggested Citation

  • Christoph March & Anthony Ziegelmeyer, 2016. "Altruistic Observational Learning," CESifo Working Paper Series 5792, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_5792
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp5792.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marco Angrisani & Antonio Guarino & Philippe Jehiel & Toru Kitagawa, 2021. "Information Redundancy Neglect versus Overconfidence: A Social Learning Experiment," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 163-197, August.
    2. Markus Noth & Martin Weber, 2003. "Information Aggregation with Random Ordering: Cascades and Overconfidence," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 113(484), pages 166-189, January.
    3. Marco Cipriani & Antonio Guarino, 2014. "Estimating a Structural Model of Herd Behavior in Financial Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(1), pages 224-251, January.
    4. Bacharach, Michael, 1999. "Interactive team reasoning: A contribution to the theory of co-operation," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 117-147, June.
    5. Kreps, David M & Wilson, Robert, 1982. "Sequential Equilibria," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(4), pages 863-894, July.
    6. Marco Cipriani & Antonio Guarino, 2009. "Herd Behavior in Financial Markets: An Experiment with Financial Market Professionals," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 7(1), pages 206-233, March.
    7. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2018. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 1645-1692.
    8. Frechette, Guillaume R. & Schotter, Andrew (ed.), 2015. "Handbook of Experimental Economic Methodology," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195328325.
    9. Antonio E. Bernardo & Ivo Welch, 2001. "On the Evolution of Overconfidence and Entrepreneurs," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(3), pages 301-330, September.
    10. Ben Greiner, 2015. "Subject pool recruitment procedures: organizing experiments with ORSEE," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 114-125, July.
    11. A. Colin Cameron & Douglas L. Miller, 2010. "Robust Inference with Clustered Data," Working Papers 106, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    12. Jonathan E. Alevy & Michael S. Haigh & John A. List, 2007. "Information Cascades: Evidence from a Field Experiment with Financial Market Professionals," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 62(1), pages 151-180, February.
    13. Corazzini, Luca & Greiner, Ben, 2007. "Herding, social preferences and (non-)conformity," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 97(1), pages 74-80, October.
    14. Bogaçhan Çelen & Shachar Kariv, 2004. "Distinguishing Informational Cascades from Herd Behavior in the Laboratory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 484-498, June.
    15. Timothy G. Conley & Christopher R. Udry, 2010. "Learning about a New Technology: Pineapple in Ghana," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 35-69, March.
    16. Jacob K. Goeree & Thomas R. Palfrey & Brian W. Rogers & Richard D. McKelvey, 2007. "Self-Correcting Information Cascades," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 74(3), pages 733-762.
    17. Duffy, John & Hopkins, Ed & Kornienko, Tatiana & Ma, Mingye, 2019. "Information choice in a social learning experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 295-315.
    18. Anthony Ziegelmeyer & Frédéric Koessler & Juergen Bracht & Eyal Winter, 2010. "Fragility of information cascades: an experimental study using elicited beliefs," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 13(2), pages 121-145, June.
    19. Jacob Goeree & Thomas Palfrey & Brian Rogers, 2006. "Social learning with private and common values," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 28(2), pages 245-264, June.
    20. Georg Weizsacker, 2010. "Do We Follow Others When We Should? A Simple Test of Rational Expectations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(5), pages 2340-2360, December.
    21. Rabin, Matthew & Eyster, Erik & Weizsäcker, Georg, 2015. "An Experiment on Social Mislearning," CEPR Discussion Papers 11020, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    22. McKelvey Richard D. & Palfrey Thomas R., 1995. "Quantal Response Equilibria for Normal Form Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 6-38, July.
    23. Ali, S. Nageeb, 2018. "On the role of responsiveness in rational herds," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 79-82.
    24. Sebastian Berger & Christoph Feldhaus & Axel Ockenfels, 2018. "A shared identity promotes herding in an information cascade game," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 4(1), pages 63-72, July.
    25. Jacob K. Goeree & Leeat Yariv, 2015. "Conformity in the lab," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 15-28, July.
    26. S. Ali & Navin Kartik, 2012. "Herding with collective preferences," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 51(3), pages 601-626, November.
    27. A. Colin Cameron & Douglas L. Miller, 2010. "Robust Inference with Clustered Data," Working Papers 318, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    28. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & Benjamin Enke & David B. Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2017. "Global Evidence on Economic Preferences," NBER Working Papers 23943, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    29. March, Christoph & Ziegelmeyer, Anthony, 2020. "Altruistic observational learning," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    30. Hongbin Cai & Yuyu Chen & Hanming Fang, 2009. "Observational Learning: Evidence from a Randomized Natural Field Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 864-882, June.
    31. Anthony Ziegelmeyer & Christoph March & Sebastian Kr?gel, 2013. "Do We Follow Others When We Should? A Simple Test of Rational Expectations: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(6), pages 2633-2642, October.
    32. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Hirshleifer, David & Welch, Ivo, 1992. "A Theory of Fads, Fashion, Custom, and Cultural Change in Informational Cascades," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(5), pages 992-1026, October.
    33. Enrico Moretti, 2011. "Social Learning and Peer Effects in Consumption: Evidence from Movie Sales," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 78(1), pages 356-393.
    34. Anderson, Lisa R & Holt, Charles A, 1997. "Information Cascades in the Laboratory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(5), pages 847-862, December.
    35. Jacob K. Goeree & Charles A. Holt & Thomas R. Palfrey, 2016. "Quantal Response Equilibrium:A Stochastic Theory of Games," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10743.
    36. Yan Chen & Sherry Xin Li, 2009. "Group Identity and Social Preferences," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 431-457, March.
    37. Vives, Xavier, 1997. "Learning from Others: A Welfare Analysis," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 177-200, August.
    38. Christoph March & Anthony Ziegelmeyer, 2018. "Excessive Herding in the Laboratory: The Role of Intuitive Judgments," CESifo Working Paper Series 6855, CESifo.
    39. Abhijit V. Banerjee, 1992. "A Simple Model of Herd Behavior," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(3), pages 797-817.
    40. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    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. March, Christoph & Ziegelmeyer, Anthony, 2020. "Altruistic observational learning," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    2. Diefeng Peng & Yulei Rao & Xianming Sun & Erte Xiao, 2019. "Optional Disclosure and Observational Learning," Monash Economics Working Papers 05-18, Monash University, Department of Economics.

    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. Duffy, John & Hopkins, Ed & Kornienko, Tatiana, 2021. "Lone wolf or herd animal? Information choice and learning from others," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    2. Duffy, John & Hopkins, Ed & Kornienko, Tatiana & Ma, Mingye, 2019. "Information choice in a social learning experiment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 295-315.
    3. Van Parys, Jessica & Ash, Elliott, 2018. "Sequential decision-making with group identity," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 1-18.
    4. Diefeng Peng & Yulei Rao & Xianming Sun & Erte Xiao, 2019. "Optional Disclosure and Observational Learning," Monash Economics Working Papers 05-18, Monash University, Department of Economics.
    5. Christoph March & Anthony Ziegelmeyer, 2018. "Excessive Herding in the Laboratory: The Role of Intuitive Judgments," CESifo Working Paper Series 6855, CESifo.
    6. Cao, Qian & Li, Jianbiao & Niu, Xiaofei, 2019. "The role of overconfidence in overweighting private information: Does gender matter?," EconStor Preprints 203448, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    7. Wenbo Zou & Xue Xu, 2023. "Ingroup bias in a social learning experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 26(1), pages 27-54, March.
    8. Sebastian Berger & Christoph Feldhaus & Axel Ockenfels, 2018. "A shared identity promotes herding in an information cascade game," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 4(1), pages 63-72, July.
    9. Lukas Meub & Till Proeger & Hendrik Hüning, 2017. "A comparison of endogenous and exogenous timing in a social learning experiment," Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination, Springer;Society for Economic Science with Heterogeneous Interacting Agents, vol. 12(1), pages 143-166, April.
    10. De Filippis, Roberta & Guarino, Antonio & Jehiel, Philippe & Kitagawa, Toru, 2022. "Non-Bayesian updating in a social learning experiment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 199(C).
    11. Marco Angrisani & Antonio Guarino & Philippe Jehiel & Toru Kitagawa, 2021. "Information Redundancy Neglect versus Overconfidence: A Social Learning Experiment," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 163-197, August.
    12. Penczynski, Stefan P., 2017. "The nature of social learning: Experimental evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 148-165.
    13. Roberta De Filippis & Antonio Guarino & Philippe Jehiel & Toru Kitagawa, 2016. "Updating ambiguous beliefs in a social learning experiment," CeMMAP working papers CWP18/16, Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    14. Meub, Lukas & Proeger, Till & Hüning, Hendrik, 2013. "A comparison of endogenous and exogenous timing in a social learning experiment," University of Göttingen Working Papers in Economics 167, University of Goettingen, Department of Economics.
    15. Anthony Ziegelmeyer & Frédéric Koessler & Juergen Bracht & Eyal Winter, 2010. "Fragility of information cascades: an experimental study using elicited beliefs," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 13(2), pages 121-145, June.
    16. Christoph March & Sebastian Krügel & Anthony Ziegelmeyer, 2012. "Do We Follow Private Information when We Should? Laboratory Evidence on Naive Herding," PSE Working Papers halshs-00671378, HAL.
    17. Bikhchandani, Sushil & Hirshleifer, David & Tamuz, Omer & Welch, Ivo, 2021. "Information Cascades and Social Learning," MPRA Paper 107927, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Puput Tri Komalasari & Marwan Asri & Bernardinus M. Purwanto & Bowo Setiyono, 2022. "Herding behaviour in the capital market: What do we know and what is next?," Management Review Quarterly, Springer, vol. 72(3), pages 745-787, September.
    19. Asanov, Igor, 2021. "Bandit cascade: A test of observational learning in the bandit problem," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 189(C), pages 150-171.
    20. Fishman, Arthur & Fishman, Ram & Gneezy, Uri, 2019. "A tale of two food stands: Observational learning in the field," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 101-108.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    social learning; informational herding; altruistic behavior;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D64 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness

    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:ces:ceswps:_5792. 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: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    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.