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Preference for Information

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What is the relationship between an agent's attitude towards information, and her attitude towards risk? If an agent always prefers more information, does this imply that she obeys the independence axiom? We provide a substitution property on preferences that is equivalent to the agent (intrinsically) liking information in the absence of contingent choices. We use this property to explore both questions, first in general, then for recursive smooth preferences, and then in specific recursive non-expected utility models. Given smoothness, for both the rank dependence and betweenness models, if an agent is information-loving then her preferences can depart from Kreps and Porteus's (1978) temporal expected utility model in at most one stage. This result does not extend to quadratic utility. Finally, we give several conditions such that, provided the agent intrinsically likes information, Blackwell's (1953) result holds; that is, she will always prefer more informative signals, whether or not she can condition her subsequent behavior on the signal.

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  • Simon Grant & Atsushi Kajii & Ben Polak, 1996. "Preference for Information," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 1114, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University.
    • Handle: RePEc:cwl:cwldpp:1114
    Note: CFP 974.
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    Cited by:

    1. Elyès Jouini & Clotilde Napp, 2018. "The Impact of Health-Related Emotions on Belief Formation and Behavior," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 84(3), pages 405-427, May.
    2. Edward SchleeE, 1997. "The sure thing principle and the value of information," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 42(1), pages 21-36, January.
    3. Hagen Lindstädt, 2007. "Valuing Others’ Information under Imperfect Expectations," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 62(4), pages 335-353, May.
    4. Botond Kőszegi, 2010. "Utility from anticipation and personal equilibrium," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 44(3), pages 415-444, September.
    5. Ali Lazrak, 2005. "Generalized stochastic differential utility and preference for information," Papers math/0503579, arXiv.org.
    6. Bruno Bassan & Olivier Gossner & Marco Scarsini & Shmuel Zamir, 2003. "Positive value of information in games," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 32(1), pages 17-31, December.
    7. Simon Grant & Atsushi Kajii & Ben Polak, 2000. "Preference for Information and Dynamic Consistency," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 263-286, May.
    8. Alfred Müller & Marco Scarsini, 2002. "Even Risk-Averters may Love Risk," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 52(1), pages 81-99, February.
    9. Eichberger, Jürgen & Guerdjikova, Ani, 2013. "Ambiguity, data and preferences for information – A case-based approach," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 148(4), pages 1433-1462.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D80 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - General
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D89 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Other

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