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Information Design: A Unified Perspective

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Abstract

Given a game with uncertain payoffs, information design analyzes the extent to which the provision of information alone can influence the behavior of the players. Information design has a literal interpretation, under which there is a real information designer who can commit to the choice of the best information structure (from her perspective) for a set of participants in a game. We emphasize a metaphorical interpretation, under which the information design problem is used by the analyst to characterize play in the game under many different information structures. We provide an introduction into the basic issues and insights of a rapidly growing literature in information design. We show how the literal and metaphorical interpretations of information design unify a large body of existing work, including that on communication in games (Myerson (1991)), Bayesian persuasion (Kamenica and Gentzkow (2011)) and some of our own recent work on robust predictions in games of incomplete information.

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  • Dirk Bergemann & Stephen Morris, 2017. "Information Design: A Unified Perspective," Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers 2075R3, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics, Yale University, revised Mar 2018.
  • Handle: RePEc:cwl:cwldpp:2075r3
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Information design; Bayesian persuasion; correlated equilibrium; incomplete information; robust predictions; information structure;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • 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

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