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The Strategies Behind Their Actions: A Method To Infer Repeated-Game Strategies And An Application To Buyer Behavior

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Author Info
Jim Engle-Warnick ()
Bradley Ruffle ()

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Abstract

We introduce a Bayesian method to infer repeted-game strategies in the form of if-then statements that best describe individuals' observed actions. We apply this method to buyer behavior in posted-offer market experiments. While the strategies of one-quarter of the buyers in our experiments correspond to the game-theoretic prediction of passive price-taking, for three-quarters of the buyers we infer repeated-game strategies that condition on time, price, and combinations of time and price. Our analysis fills a gap in a literature that studies the convergence of pricing behavior in posted-offer markets but has not addressed the market as a repeated game. We propose that strategy inference should at least complement existing methods of statistical inference on observed strategic behavior.

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Paper provided by McGill University, Department of Economics in its series Departmental Working Papers with number 2005-04.

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Length: 43 pages
Date of creation: Sep 2006
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:mcl:mclwop:2005-04

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
D42 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure and Pricing - - - Monopoly

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References listed on IDEAS
Please 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.:
  1. El-Gamal, Mahmoud A. & Grether, David M., 1995. "Are People Bayesian? Uncovering Behavioral Strategies," Working Papers 919, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences. [Downloadable!]
  2. Holt, Charles A, 1989. "The Exercise of Market Power in Laboratory Experiments," Journal of Law & Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(2), pages S107-30, October.
    Other versions:
  3. Reinhard Selten & Michael Mitzkewitz & Gerald R. Uhlich, 1997. "Duopoly Strategies Programmed by Experienced Players," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(3), pages 517-556, May.
    Other versions:
  4. Kreps, David M. & Milgrom, Paul & Roberts, John & Wilson, Robert, 1982. "Rational cooperation in the finitely repeated prisoners' dilemma," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 245-252, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Stahl Dale O. & Wilson Paul W., 1995. "On Players' Models of Other Players: Theory and Experimental Evidence," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 218-254, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Costa-Gomes, Miguel & Crawford, Vincent P & Broseta, Bruno, 2001. "Cognition and Behavior in Normal-Form Games: An Experimental Study," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 69(5), pages 1193-1235, September.
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  7. John Duffy & Jim Warnick, 1999. "Using Symbolic Regression to Infer Strategies from Experimental Data," Computing in Economics and Finance 1999 1033, Society for Computational Economics.
  8. Jim Engle-Warnick & Bradley Ruffle, 2006. "Buyer Concentration As A Source Of Countervailing Power: Evidence From Experimental Posted-Offer Markets," Departmental Working Papers 2006-12, McGill University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  9. Johnson, Eric J. & Camerer, Colin & Sen, Sankar & Rymon, Talia, 1998. "Detecting Failures of Backward Induction: Monitoring Information Search in Sequential Bargaining," Working Papers 1040, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences. [Downloadable!]
  10. Daniel Houser & Michael Keane & Kevin McCabe, 2004. "Behavior in a Dynamic Decision Problem: An Analysis of Experimental Evidence Using a Bayesian Type Classification Algorithm," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 72(3), pages 781-822, 05. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  11. Inderst, Roman & Wey, Christian, 2003. " Bargaining, Mergers, and Technology Choice in Bilaterally Oligopolistic Industries," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 34(1), pages 1-19, Spring.
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  12. Geweke, John & Keane, Michael, 2001. "Computationally intensive methods for integration in econometrics," Handbook of Econometrics, in: J.J. Heckman & E.E. Leamer (ed.), Handbook of Econometrics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 56, pages 3463-3568 Elsevier. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  13. John F. Geweke & Michael P. Keane, 1996. "Bayesian inference for dynamic choice models without the need for dynamic programming," Working Papers 564, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. [Downloadable!]
  14. Smith, Vernon L, 1976. "Experimental Economics: Induced Value Theory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 274-79, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  15. Manski, Charles F., 2002. "Identification of decision rules in experiments on simple games of proposal and response," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(4-5), pages 880-891, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  16. Engle-Warnick, Jim, 2003. "Inferring strategies from observed actions: a nonparametric, binary tree classification approach," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 27(11-12), pages 2151-2170, September. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please 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.)

  1. Todd Kaplan & Bradley Ruffle, 2004. "It's My Turn ... Please, After You: An Experimental Study of Cooperation and Social Conventions," Experimental 0410001, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
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