Doctoral Dissertation Research in Economics: Bayesian Persuasion in the Lab?

经济学博士论文研究：实验室中的贝叶斯说服？

• 批准号: 1919390
• 负责人: Dan Levin
• 金额: $ 1.64万
• 依托单位: Ohio State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2019-08-15 至 2021-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1919390&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Economics; Bayesian

Bayesian Persuasion describes the phenomena where a sender of information intends to sway a receiver to take his/her desired action by choosing what information the receiver can access. This occurs in many economic and social settings, for example a prosecutor persuading a judge to convict a suspect or a politician persuading voters that he/she is the best candidate and therefore deserve their vote. While Bayesian Persuasion has been studied in theory, there has been little real world study of its implications. Given the prevalence and complexity of the use of Bayesian Persuasion, it is important to investigate whether the sender can find the best information to induce his/her desired action with the maximum frequency, and if not, what makes it so difficult. This proposed research will use a series of experiments to study the Bayesian Persuasion phenomenon. Such an investigation helps to build an understanding about several situations that involve Bayesian Persuasion, such as how a prosecutor chooses to investigate a criminal case and how politicians design their promotion campaigns. The results of this research will improve the efficiency of advertising, public policy campaigns, and general policy discussions.This project uses a series of lab experiments to test the theory of Bayesian Persuasion. The researchers will design laboratory experiments where the process of Bayesian Persuasion is maximally simplified for the sender. The experimental design will eliminate the need for the sender to perform any Bayesian updating. Because people are in general not capable of Bayesian updating, such simplification allows researchers to focus solely on the key parts of the Bayesian Persuasion reasoning. The experiment will then introduce some realistic difficulties to the problem to check the robustness of the results. The research goal is to shed light on the empirical soundness of the theory of Bayesian Persuasion---to what extent is the theoretical prediction correct and how should economists revise their understanding of the theory if necessary. The results of this research project will not only (in)validate the theory of Bayesian Persuasion but also show its practical application. This will improve discourse on important issues in business, public policy, and governance generally.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

贝叶斯说服描述了一种现象，其中的信息发件人打算通过选择接收者可以访问的信息来摇摆接收者采取所需的行动。这发生在许多经济和社会环境中，例如，检察官说服法官定罪犯罪嫌疑人或政治家说服选民，他/她是最好的候选人，因此应得到投票。尽管从理论上讲了贝叶斯的说服力，但对其含义几乎没有研究。鉴于使用贝叶斯说服的流行和复杂性，重要的是要研究发件人是否可以找到最佳的信息以最大的频率诱导他/她所需的动作，如果没有，则使它如此困难。 这项拟议的研究将使用一系列实验来研究贝叶斯说服现象。 这样的调查有助于建立对涉及贝叶斯说服的几种情况的理解，例如检察官如何选择调查刑事案件以及政客如何设计其晋升运动。这项研究的结果将提高广告，公共政策运动和一般政策讨论的效率。本项目使用一系列实验室实验来测试贝叶斯说服力理论。 研究人员将设计实验室实验，其中最大程度地简化了贝叶斯说服的过程。 实验设计将消除发件人执行任何贝叶斯更新的需求。 由于人们通常没有贝叶斯更新，因此这种简化使研究人员只能专注于贝叶斯说服推理的关键部分。然后，该实验将引入一些现实的困难，以检查结果的鲁棒性。研究目标是阐明贝叶斯说服理论的经验声音 - 理论预测正确的程度是正确的，以及经济学家应在必要时如何修改他们对理论的理解。 该研究项目的结果不仅（在）验证贝叶斯说服理论，而且还将显示其实际应用。这将一般来说，这将改善有关商业，公共政策和治理中重要问题的论述。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子优点和更广泛影响的审查标准来评估值得支持的。