Experiments on Equilibrium Selection in Coordination Games (REU Supplement)

实验室实验，如本项目中的实验，检验和丰富了经济理论。这个项目使用实验室实验来研究协调博弈中的均衡选择问题。这些博弈的特点是存在多个可排名的均衡。在这些博弈中，当所有参与者在一个均衡中相对于另一个均衡中处于更好的状态，但可能无法明确地协调他们的策略以实现理想的结果时，协调失败就会发生。该项目探讨了协调失败是否会发生，并提供了增加这种失败可能性的因素的特征。它考察了不同机制的能力，例如沟通和赛前体验，以减弱这些故障。该项目还通过研究产品市场中的双重道德风险问题来考虑协调博弈的经济应用。经济理论认为，协调失灵可能是宏观经济不稳定和微观市场不完善的主要因素。该项目将为在受控的实验室环境中协调失败的存在和重要性提供一些初步的经验证据。这个项目在方法上也很重要，因为它测试了广泛使用的博弈论概念，如赛前沟通机制。初步结果表明，一种合理的赛前沟通机制未能通过实验室实验测试。

Laboratory experiments, such as the experiments in this project, test and enrich economic theory. This project uses laboratory experiments to examine questions of equilibrium selection in coordination games. These games are characterized by the existence of multiple equilibria which are rankable. In these games, coordination failures occur when all players are better off in one equilibrium relative to another yet may be unable to explicitly coordinate their strategies to achieve the preferred outcome. The project explores whether coordination failures arise and provides a characterization of the factors which increase the likelihood of such failures. It examines the ability of different mechanisms, e.g., communication and pre-play experience, to attenuate these failures. The project also considers an economic application of a coordination game by examining a double moral hazard problem in product markets. Economic theory suggests that coordination failure could be a major factor in macroeconomic instability and microeconomic market imperfections. This project will provide some of the first empirical evidence of the existence and significance of coordination failures in a controlled laboratory environment. This project is also methodologically important because it tests widely used game-theoretic concepts such as mechanisms for pre- play communication. Preliminary results suggest that a plausible pre-play communication mechanism fails laboratory experimental tests.