Collaborative Research: Sophisticated Learning and Strategic Teaching in Repeated Games

HO#0078853我们的研究解决了个人和组织如何从战略情景中学习经验，如讨价还价、协调联合行动(团队合作)、为新产品选择价格和功能、拍卖等。在之前的研究中，我们发现了一个数学公式，它解释了人们如何从经验中学习，但公式的具体细节(其“参数”)似乎因情况而异，就像人们以不同的方式学习一样。因此，我们建议探索为什么这些参数似乎是不同的。此外，大多数关于策略学习的数学理论都假设人们只回顾过去的经历。我们还建议扩展这些理论，以允许那些意识到其他人正在从经验中学习的人，从而能够猜测其他人将根据过去发生的事情进行什么。如果玩家是“老练的”，从这个意义上说，他们采取短期内不完美的行动是值得的，“教”其他正在学习的玩家采取有利于长期“老师”的行动。这种教育可能对教师有利，但对社会不利(例如，当公司通过威胁非法报复来吓跑创新竞争对手时)，或者对所有人都有利(例如，当公司向其他人保证他们可以打赌时)。我们的研究开发了一种精确的数学理论，可以了解老练的球员的行为方式，以及他们的授课时间。我们用这一理论来解释从实验中观察到的情况，并预测在新的情况下是否会发生教学。

Ho #0078853Our research addresses how people and organizations learn from experiencein strategic situations like bargaining, coordinating joint actions(teamwork), choosing prices and features for new products, bidding inauctions, etc. In previous research we discovered a mathematical formulawhich explains how people appear to learn from experience, but thenumerical details of the formula (its "parameters) seem to vary fromsituation to situation, as if people are learning in different ways. Wetherefore propose to explore why these parameters seem to vary. Inaddition, most mathematical theories of strategic learning assume thatpeople only look back at past experiences. We also propose to extend thesetheories to allow for people who realize that other people are learningfrom experience, and are able to therefore outguess what others will dobased on what happened in the past. If players are "sophisticated", inthis sense, it pays for them to take actions that are not perfect in thenear-term, to "teach" other players who are learning to take actions whichwill benefit the "teachers" in the long-term. This teaching can bebeneficial for the teacher but bad for society (e.g., when firms scareaway innovative competitors by threatening illegal retaliation), orbeneficial for everyone (e.g., when firms reassure others that they can betrusted). Our research develops a precise mathematical theory of howsophisticated players behave and when it pays for them to teach. We usethe theory to explain observations from experiments and predicts whetherteaching will occur in new situations.