Applied Economics: Repeated play of prisoner’s dilemma against robot opponents
Published: 2 February 2022
9 February. Professor Ed Hopkins, Edinburgh School of Economics
Professor Ed Hopkins, Edinburgh School of Economics
'Facing the Grim Truth: Repeated Play of Prisoner’s Dilemma Against Robot Opponents'
Wednesday 9 February, 3pm - 4.15pm
Zoom online seminar
Abstract
We report on an experiment where subjects play an indefinitely repeated prisoner’s dilemma game (1) against robot opponents known to play the Grim trigger strategy, and (2) the game’s continuation probability is varied affecting whether cooperation can be rationalised. These two innovations allow us to classify the play in each supergame in one of 6 mutually exclusive categories, allowing us to identify whether subjects play theoretically optimally, whether they are biased towards/against cooperation, whether they make strategic mistakes, or whether they do something else. Some subjects defect after cooperating, perhaps anticipating the end of a supergame (in an attempt to "snipe"), and others cooperate after defecting (thus making strategic errors), which is harder to rationalise. Consistent with a simple model of inattention, we find two gradients in strategic play, with cognitive differences predicting the optimality versus errors gradient, and non-cognitive differences predicting a persistent bias towards cooperation. These results suggest that cognition is important for the successful implementation of strategies.
Biography
Ed Hopkins is a Professor at the School of Economics, University of Edinburgh. He obtained his PhD from the European University Institute, in Florence, Italy. He has also been a visitor at the University of Pittsburgh, UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine, Caltech, Queensland, GREQAM and UBC. Professor Hopkins works in game theory and has four main interests. The first is applying game theory to social issues, with a particular focus on tournament models and their relation to inequality. The second is behavioural game theory, considering games between players with non-standard preferences and/or bounded rationality. The third is where he started off, evolutionary game theory, which looks at how play out of equilibrium changes over time. The fourth is experimental economics, where he is interested in testing any or all of the above in the lab.
Further information: business-events@glasgow.ac.uk
First published: 2 February 2022
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