IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/gamebe/v110y2018icp318-329.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

To reveal or not to reveal: Privacy preferences and economic frictions

Author

Listed:
  • Augenblick, Ned
  • Bodoh-Creed, Aaron

Abstract

We model two agents who wish to determine if their types match, but who also desire to reveal as little information as possible to non-matching types. For example, firms considering a merger must determine the merger's profitability, but would prefer to keep their information private if the deal fails. In the model, agents with different traits reveal information to a potential partner to determine if they share the same type, but face a penalty depending on the accuracy of their partner's posterior beliefs. With limited signaling, there is a universally-preferred dynamic communication protocol in which traits are sequentially revealed depending on the sensitivity of the trait. Interestingly, the rarity of an agent's traits plays no role due to the balance of opposing effects: although revealing a rare trait reveals more information immediately, it also screens more partners from later learning information about other traits.

Suggested Citation

  • Augenblick, Ned & Bodoh-Creed, Aaron, 2018. "To reveal or not to reveal: Privacy preferences and economic frictions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 318-329.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:110:y:2018:i:c:p:318-329
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2017.10.014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0899825617301860
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.geb.2017.10.014?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rosenberg, Dinah & Solan, Eilon & Vieille, Nicolas, 2013. "Strategic information exchange," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 444-467.
    2. Dilip Mookherjee & Masatoshi Tsumagari, 2014. "Mechanism Design with Communication Constraints," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 122(5), pages 1094-1129.
    3. Fadel, Ronald & Segal, Ilya, 2009. "The communication cost of selfishness," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 144(5), pages 1895-1920, September.
    4. Johannes Hörner & Andrzej Skrzypacz, 2016. "Selling Information," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 124(6), pages 1515-1562.
    5. Jeremy C. Stein, 2008. "Conversations among Competitors," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(5), pages 2150-2162, December.
    6. Wioletta Dziuda & Ronen Gradwohl, 2015. "Achieving Cooperation under Privacy Concerns," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(3), pages 142-173, August.
    7. Geanakoplos, John & Pearce, David & Stacchetti, Ennio, 1989. "Psychological games and sequential rationality," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 60-79, March.
    8. Robert J. Aumann & Sergiu Hart, 2003. "Long Cheap Talk," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(6), pages 1619-1660, November.
      • Robert J. Aumann & Sergiu Hart, 2002. "Long Cheap Talk," Discussion Paper Series dp284, The Federmann Center for the Study of Rationality, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, revised Nov 2002.
    9. Blumrosen, Liad & Feldman, Michal, 2013. "Mechanism design with a restricted action space," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 424-443.
    10. Milgrom, Paul, 2010. "Simplified mechanisms with an application to sponsored-search auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 62-70, September.
    11. Melumad, Nahum & Mookherjee, Dilip & Reichelstein, Stefan, 1992. "A theory of responsibility centers," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(4), pages 445-484, December.
    12. Kos, Nenad, 2012. "Communication and efficiency in auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 233-249.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ganglmair, Bernhard & Holcomb, Alex & Myung, Noah, 2020. "Expectations of reciprocity when competitors share information: Experimental evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 244-267.
    2. Ehud Lehrer & Dimitry Shaiderman, 2022. "Markovian Persuasion with Stochastic Revelations," Papers 2204.08659, arXiv.org, revised May 2022.
    3. Honryo, Takakazu, 2018. "Dynamic persuasion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 178(C), pages 36-58.
    4. Ehud Lehrer & Dimitry Shaiderman, 2021. "Markovian Persuasion," Papers 2111.14365, arXiv.org.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ryuji Sano, 2021. "Dynamic communication mechanism design," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 57(1), pages 163-180, July.
    2. Blumrosen, Liad & Feldman, Michal, 2013. "Mechanism design with a restricted action space," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 424-443.
    3. Gorkem Celik, 2015. "Implementation by Gradual Revelation," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 46(2), pages 271-296, June.
    4. Ran Eilat & Kfir Eliaz Eliaz & Xiaosheng Mu, 2021. "Bayesian Privacy," Working Papers 2021-65, Princeton University. Economics Department..
    5. Alexander Teytelboym & Shengwu Li & Scott Duke Kominers & Mohammad Akbarpour & Piotr Dworczak, 2021. "Discovering Auctions: Contributions of Paul Milgrom and Robert Wilson," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 123(3), pages 709-750, July.
    6. Ricardo Alonso & Wouter Dessein & Niko Matouschek, 2008. "When Does Coordination Require Centralization?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(1), pages 145-179, March.
    7. Migrow, Dimitri, 2021. "Designing communication hierarchies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    8. López-Pérez, Raúl, 2009. "The Power of Words: Why Communication fosters Cooperation and Efficiency," Working Papers in Economic Theory 2009/01, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain), Department of Economic Analysis (Economic Theory and Economic History).
    9. Johannes Hörner & Andrzej Skrzypacz, 2016. "Selling Information," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 124(6), pages 1515-1562.
    10. Kos, Nenad, 2014. "Asking questions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 642-650.
    11. Bernhard Ganglmair & Emanuele Tarantino, 2014. "Conversation with secrets," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 45(2), pages 273-302, June.
    12. Sher, Itai & Vohra, Rakesh, 2015. "Price discrimination through communication," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(2), May.
    13. Kos, Nenad, 2012. "Communication and efficiency in auctions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 75(1), pages 233-249.
    14. Rivera Mora, Ernesto, 2024. "Mechanism design with belief-dependent preferences," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 216(C).
    15. Wioletta Dziuda & Ronen Gradwohl, 2015. "Achieving Cooperation under Privacy Concerns," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(3), pages 142-173, August.
    16. Eliaz, Kfir & Eilat, Ran & Mu, Xiaosheng, 2019. "Optimal Privacy-Constrained Mechanisms," CEPR Discussion Papers 13536, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Edoardo Grillo, 2013. "Reference Dependence, Risky Projects and Credible Information Transmission," Carlo Alberto Notebooks 331, Collegio Carlo Alberto.
    18. Babaioff, Moshe & Blumrosen, Liad & Schapira, Michael, 2013. "The communication burden of payment determination," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 153-167.
    19. Honryo, Takakazu, 2018. "Dynamic persuasion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 178(C), pages 36-58.
    20. Ederer, Florian & Stremitzer, Alexander, 2017. "Promises and expectations," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 161-178.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Privacy; Dynamic communication; Asymmetric information;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D01 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles
    • D82 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Asymmetric and Private Information; Mechanism Design
    • D83 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief; Unawareness

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:110:y:2018:i:c:p:318-329. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622836 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.