Collaborative Research: Evolution of Preferences in Strategic Environments

该奖项支持合作研究（与SBR-9809208），涉及战略环境中偏好的演变。 我们对偏好演化的研究具有以下特点：（1）侧重于偏好的相互依赖性，而不是偏好的其他方面，如对时间和风险的态度;（2）侧重于战略环境，而不是决策理论环境;（3）使用一个一般的分析框架，其中包括各种空间相互作用和匹配模型作为特例;（iv）考虑到人口中同时存在不同种类的相互依赖的偏好，（v）追求一般结果，而不是提供暗示性的例子。 如果一个人的（主观）幸福感因他人（客观）物质幸福感的变化而增强或减弱，则该人被称为具有相互依赖的偏好。偏好相互依赖可能是积极的，如利他主义，也可能是消极的，如嫉妒或怨恨。相互依赖的偏好经常被用来解释经验和实验发现，从独立偏好的更标准假设的角度来看，这些发现是异常的。 在经济学文献中，很少有人试图解释相互依赖的偏好，而那些倾向于关注简单的程式化环境。 现在人们已经很清楚，这种模式中出现的相互依存类型与所假设的特定环境密不可分，不同的环境产生不同形式的相互依存。这使得我们很难评估任何特定的偏好相互依赖模型的稳健性。文献中缺少的是对引起特定形式的偏好相互依赖的环境的一般特性的全面分析。 我们试图填补的正是文学中的这一空白。我们开发了一个分析框架的偏好进化的分析，其中包括作为特殊情况下的三个主要类别的进化环境中，已被认为在文献中的日期：随机配对或较大的子群，与地理或社会邻居的本地相互作用，以及涉及整个人口的相互作用。使用这个框架，我们研究了一些问题和相关的属性的战略环境，对应于特定形式的偏好相互依存的演变。例如，我们概括了我们以前的结果偏好的相互依赖，这表明，在涉及整个人口的互动，负面的相互依赖或嫉妒的偏好出现在各种战略设置。相反，积极的相互依存可以发展和持续在某些随机匹配和本地的互动环境，我们调查的精确设置的条件下，这种情况可能发生。

This award supports collaborative research (with SBR-9809208) which deals with the evolution of preferences in strategic environments. Our approach to the evolution of preferences is characterized by the following features: (i) a focus on preference interdependence rather than on other aspects of preferences such as attitudes toward time and risk; (ii) a focus on strategic rather than decision-theoretic environments; (iii) the use of a general analytical framework which encompasses a variety of spatial interaction and matching models as special cases; (iv) consideration of the simultaneous presence of distinct kinds of interdependent preferences in the population, and (v) the pursuit of general results rather than the provision of suggestive examples. An individual is said to have interdependent preferences if her (subjective) well-being is either enhanced or diminished by changes in the (objective) material well-being of others. Preference interdependence may be positive, as is the case with altruism, or negative, as is the case with envy or spite. Interdependent preferences have often been used to explain empirical and experimental findings that are anomalies from the perspective of the more standard postulate of independent preferences. Few attempts have been made to account for interdependent preferences in the economics literature, and those that have tend to focus on simple stylized environments. It is now well understood that the type of interdependence that emerges in such models is inextricably tied to the particular environment that is assumed, with different environments giving rise to different forms of interdependence. This makes it difficult to assess the robustness of any particular model of preference interdependence. What is missing in the literature is a comprehensive analysis of the general properties of environments that give rise to particular forms of preference interdependence. It is this gap in the literature that we attempt to fill. We develop an analytical framework for the analysis of preference evolution which subsumes as special cases the three main classes of evolutionary environments that have been considered in the literature to date: random matching in pairs or larger subgroups, local interaction with geographic or social neighbors, and interactions involving the entire population. Using this framework, we examine a number of questions and conjectures pertaining to the properties of the strategic environment that correspond to the evolution of particular forms of preference interdependence. For instance, we generalize our previous results on preference interdependence, which suggest that in interactions involving the entire population, negatively interdependent or envious preferences emerge in a variety of strategic settings. In contrast, positive interdependence can evolve and persist in certain random matching and local interaction environments, and we investigate the precise set of conditions under which this can occur.