IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/vfsc20/224518.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Trust and Reputation under Asymmetric Information

Author

Listed:
  • Janas, Moritz
  • Oljemark, Emilia

Abstract

We study the role of information about the multiplier in a finitely repeated investment game. A high multiplier increases the reputational incentives of a trustee, leading to more repayments. Our perfect Bayesian equilibrium analysis shows that if the trustee is privately informed about the multiplier, both the expected frequency of investments and repayments as well as the expected payoffs of both players are higher compared to a situation where the multiplier is public knowledge. We test this result in a laboratory experiment. The data cannot confirm the predicted welfare dominance of private information about the multiplier. We discuss potential reasons for the deviation between theory and experimental data.

Suggested Citation

  • Janas, Moritz & Oljemark, Emilia, 2020. "Trust and Reputation under Asymmetric Information," VfS Annual Conference 2020 (Virtual Conference): Gender Economics 224518, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:vfsc20:224518
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/224518/1/vfs-2020-pid-38496.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Anderhub, Vital & Engelmann, Dirk & Guth, Werner, 2002. "An experimental study of the repeated trust game with incomplete information," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 197-216, June.
    2. 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.
    3. Lunawat, Radhika, 2013. "An experimental investigation of reputation effects of disclosure in an investment/trust game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 130-144.
    4. Watson, Joel, 2002. "Starting Small and Commitment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 176-199, January.
    5. Lucy Ackert & Bryan Church & Shawn Davis, 2011. "An experimental examination of the effect of potential revelation of identity on satisfying obligations," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(1-2), pages 69-80.
    6. Kreps, David M. & Wilson, Robert, 1982. "Reputation and imperfect information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 253-279, August.
    7. 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.
    8. Blount, Sally, 1995. "When Social Outcomes Aren't Fair: The Effect of Causal Attributions on Preferences," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 131-144, August.
    9. Joel Sobel, 1985. "A Theory of Credibility," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 52(4), pages 557-573.
    10. Brandts, Jordi & Figueras, Neus, 2003. "An exploration of reputation formation in experimental games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 89-115, January.
    11. Melis Kartal, 2018. "Honest Equilibria in Reputation Games: The Role of Time Preferences," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 10(1), pages 278-314, February.
    12. Berg Joyce & Dickhaut John & McCabe Kevin, 1995. "Trust, Reciprocity, and Social History," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 122-142, July.
    13. Watson, Joel, 1999. "Starting Small and Renegotiation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 52-90, March.
    14. Lunawat, Radhika, 2016. "Reputation effects of information sharing," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 75-91.
    15. Camerer, Colin & Weigelt, Keith, 1988. "Experimental Tests of a Sequential Equilibrium Reputation Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 56(1), pages 1-36, January.
    16. Neral, John & Ochs, Jack, 1992. "The Sequential Equilibrium Theory of Reputation Building: A Further Test," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(5), pages 1151-1169, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Janas, Moritz & Oljemark, Emilia, 2021. "Trust and reputation under asymmetric information," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 97-124.
    2. Kartal, Melis & Müller, Wieland & Tremewan, James, 2021. "Building trust: The costs and benefits of gradualism," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 258-275.
    3. Brown, M. & Serra Garcia, M., 2010. "Relational Contracting Under the Threat of Expropriation – Experimental Evidence," Other publications TiSEM 2a3179b3-7300-4aee-a62f-7, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    4. Keser, Claudia & Späth, Maximilian, 2021. "The value of bad ratings: An experiment on the impact of distortions in reputation systems," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    5. Cochard, Francois & Nguyen Van, Phu & Willinger, Marc, 2004. "Trusting behavior in a repeated investment game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 31-44, September.
    6. Brown, Martin & Serra-Garcia, Marta, 2011. "The Threat of Exclusion and Relational Contracting," Discussion Papers in Economics 12287, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    7. Brown, Martin & Serra-García, Marta, 2014. "The Threat of Exclusion and Implicit Contracting," Working Papers on Finance 1407, University of St. Gallen, School of Finance, revised Jun 2016.
    8. Martin Brown & Marta Serra-Garcia, 2017. "The Threat of Exclusion and Implicit Contracting," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(12), pages 4081-4100, December.
    9. Jacob LaRiviere & Matthew McMahon & William Neilson, 2018. "Shareholder Protection and Agency Costs: An Experimental Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(7), pages 3108-3128, July.
    10. Claudia Keser & Maximilian Späth, 2020. "The Value of Bad Ratings: An Experiment on the Impact of Distortions in Reputation Systems," CIRANO Working Papers 2020s-22, CIRANO.
    11. Butler, Jeffrey V. & Carbone, Enrica & Conzo, Pierluigi & Spagnolo, Giancarlo, 2020. "Past performance and entry in procurement: An experimental investigation," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 179-195.
    12. Johnsen, Åshild A. & Kvaløy, Ola, 2016. "Does strategic kindness crowd out prosocial behavior?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 132(PA), pages 1-11.
    13. Dimitri Dubois & Marc Willinger, 2007. "The role of players’ identification in the population on the trusting and the trustworthy behavior an experimental investigation," Working Papers 07-06, LAMETA, Universtiy of Montpellier, revised Jun 2007.
    14. Roman Hoffmann & Bernhard Kittel & Mattias Larsen, 2021. "Information exchange in laboratory markets: competition, transfer costs, and the emergence of reputation," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(1), pages 118-142, March.
    15. Andreoni, James & Samuelson, Larry, 2006. "Building rational cooperation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 127(1), pages 117-154, March.
    16. Ambrus, Attila & Pathak, Parag A., 2011. "Cooperation over finite horizons: A theory and experiments," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(7), pages 500-512.
    17. Johnsen, Åshild A & Kvaløy, Ola, 2014. "You always meet twice: An experiment on intrinsic versus instrumental reciprocity," UiS Working Papers in Economics and Finance 2014/2, University of Stavanger.
    18. Daniel Woods & Maroš Servátka, 2019. "Nice to you, nicer to me: Does self-serving generosity diminish the reciprocal response?," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 22(2), pages 506-529, June.
    19. Goeschl, Timo & Jarke, Johannes, 2014. "Trust, but verify? When trustworthiness is observable only through (costly) monitoring," WiSo-HH Working Paper Series 20, University of Hamburg, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences, WISO Research Laboratory.
    20. Lunawat, Radhika, 2016. "Reputation effects of information sharing," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 75-91.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    reputation; trust; incomplete information; experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C73 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Stochastic and Dynamic Games; Evolutionary Games
    • C92 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Group Behavior
    • 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
    • M13 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - New Firms; Startups

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:zbw:vfsc20:224518. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfsocea.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.