Assessment Via Contests: (1) Persistence in Occupation Choice; (2) Over/Underconfidence and Interaction Levels

对个人自身能力和他人能力的许多评估部分是基于双边互动。 这些互动发生在同事之间、家庭成员和朋友之间，其形式可以是关于商业策略或政治的争论、对过去工作和其他同事的讨论，以及许多其他问题。在这样的互动之后，参与者通常会评估哪个参与者领先;谁赢了或输了辩论。这些相互作用可能影响个人的自我评估，从而影响职业选择和人力资本投资。这些竞赛也会影响个人对与他们互动的人的评价，因此也会影响他们对这些人的推荐。这反过来又可能影响代理人相互作用的愿望。这个项目探讨这些评估如何影响个人自己的选择和其他人的晋升。在决定从事哪种职业时，个人需要关于自己能力的信息。如果这种信号采取上述形式，即与他人的输赢，这些信号中包含的信息将受到对他人能力的感知的显著影响。人们很自然地认为，不同的职业阶层有不同的能力，这可能是个人根据自我评估选择职业的结果，而且儿童与来自特定职业阶层的父母（更普遍的是成年人）互动。在这样的环境中，不同职业阶层的孩子会接触到不同类型的信号。特别是，那些来自需要低能力的职业类别的人将观察到将他们与低能力个体进行比较的信号。这将导致职业选择的一种形式的坚持。该项目探讨了这种持久性的类型，比赛和职业选择的丰富模型，并将其与有关持久性的程式化事实进行比较。有充分的证据表明，个人错误地评估自己的能力。该项目探讨了这些不正确的评估如何蔓延到其他人的不正确评估。这项研究首先假设个人可能对自己的能力是正确的，或者他们可能有偏见;特别是他们可能过度自信或自信不足。如果这些人在其他方面是理性的，那么他们会倾向于高估或低估与他们一起参加比赛的人。这反过来又会导致那些需要被评估的人，比如晋升，想要与某些类型的评估员互动，以便使他们的评估偏向于向上。尽管存在这些错误，但增加互动可以改善评估，从而改善晋升过程。当然，偏见也可能以其他形式出现，本研究探讨了自我评估中的偏见对他人评估的影响，从而对晋升过程产生影响。这项研究将有几个贡献。它将为职业和社会流动的持久性提供新的模式。它还将探讨认知偏见如何影响组织中的晋升和其他决策。

Many assessments, both of an individual's own ability and that of others are based in part on bilateral interactions. These interactions, which take place among colleagues and between family members and friends, can take the form of arguments over business tactics or politics, discussions of past work and of other colleagues, and many other issues. After such interactions the participants usually have an assessment of which participant came out ahead; who won or lost the debate. These interactions may influence an individual's self-assessment, and thereby choices of occupation and investment in human capital. These contests will also influence an individual's assessment of the person with whom they interacted, and hence it will influence their recommendations for these others. This in turn may influence the desire of agents to interact. This project explores how these assessments affect choices by individuals themselves and of promotions of others.In deciding which occupation to pursue individuals need information about their ability. If such signals take the form noted above, namely of wins and losses against others, the information contained in these signals will be significantly influenced by the perception of the other person's ability. It is natural to assume that different occupational classes have different abilities-which would arise from individuals choosing occupations according to their self assessment-and that children interact with parents (more generally adults) from a particular occupational class. In such an environment, the children of different occupational classes will have access to different types of signals. In particular, those from occupational classes requiring low ability will observe signals that compare them to the low ability individuals. This will lead to a form of persistence in occupational choice. The project explores this persistence in a rich model of types, contests, and occupational choice, and compares it to stylized facts regarding persistence. There is ample evidence that individuals incorrectly assess their own ability. The project explores how these incorrect assessments spillover into incorrect assessments of others. The study begins by assuming that individuals may either be correct about their own ability, or they may have a bias; in particular they may either be over- or under-confident. If these individuals are otherwise rational, then they will tend to over or under evaluate those with whom they participate in contests. This in turn will lead those who need to be assessed, say for promotion, to want to interact with certain types of assessors, in order to bias their evaluations upwards. Despite these errors, the increased interaction can improve assessment and thereby the promotion process. Of course, biases may take other forms, and the research explores in general the effect that biases in self-assessment have on the assessment of others, and thereby on promotion processes. The research will have several contributions. It will provide new models of persistence in occupational and social mobility. It will also explore how biases in perception influence promotion and other decisions in organizations.