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Experimental design to persuade

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  • Kolotilin, Anton

Abstract

A sender chooses ex ante how information will be disclosed ex post. A receiver obtains public information and information disclosed by the sender. Then he takes one of two actions. The sender wishes to maximize the probability that the receiver takes the desired action. The sender optimally discloses only whether the receiver's utility is above a cutoff. I derive necessary and sufficient conditions for the sender's and receiver's welfare to be monotonic in information. In particular, the sender's welfare increases with the precision of the sender's information and decreases with the precision of public information.

Suggested Citation

  • Kolotilin, Anton, 2015. "Experimental design to persuade," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 215-226.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:gamebe:v:90:y:2015:i:c:p:215-226
    DOI: 10.1016/j.geb.2015.02.006
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    Cited by:

    1. Anton Kolotilin & Alexander Wolitzky, 2020. "The Economics of Partisan Gerrymandering," Discussion Papers 2020-12, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    2. Kolotilin, Anton & Li, Hongyi, 2021. "Relational communication," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 16(4), November.
    3. Thomas Mariotti & Nikolaus Schweizer & Nora Szech & Jonas von Wangenheim, 2023. "Information Nudges and Self-Control," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(4), pages 2182-2197, April.
    4. Gabriele Gratton & Richard Holden & Anton Kolotilin, 2015. "Timing Information Flows," Discussion Papers 2015-16, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    5. Jacopo Bizzotto & Adrien Vigier, 2021. "Can a better informed listener be easier to persuade?," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 72(3), pages 705-721, October.
    6. Rosar, Frank, 2017. "Test design under voluntary participation," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 632-655.
    7. Anton Kolotilin & Tymofiy Mylovanov & Andriy Zapechelnyuk & Ming Li, 2017. "Persuasion of a Privately Informed Receiver," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85(6), pages 1949-1964, November.
    8. Ichihashi, Shota, 2019. "Limiting Sender's information in Bayesian persuasion," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 276-288.
    9. Ronen Gradwohl & Niklas Hahn & Martin Hoefer & Rann Smorodinsky, 2020. "Reaping the Informational Surplus in Bayesian Persuasion," Papers 2006.02048, arXiv.org.
    10. James Best & Daniel Quigley, 2016. "Persuasion for the Long-Run," Economics Papers 2016-W12, Economics Group, Nuffield College, University of Oxford.
    11. Anton Kolotilin & Tymofiy Mylovanov & Andriy Zapechelnyuk, 2019. "Censorship as Optimal Persuasion," Discussion Paper Series, School of Economics and Finance 201903, School of Economics and Finance, University of St Andrews, revised 05 Mar 2020.
    12. Sonin, Konstantin & Egorov, Georgy, 2019. "Persuasion on Networks," CEPR Discussion Papers 13723, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. Tao Lin & Ce Li, 2024. "Information Design with Unknown Prior," Papers 2410.05533, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2024.
    14. Carroll, Gabriel, 2016. "Informationally robust trade and limits to contagion," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 166(C), pages 334-361.
    15. Anton Kolotilin, 2013. "Optimal Information Disclosure: Quantity vs. Quality," Discussion Papers 2013-19, School of Economics, The University of New South Wales.
    16. Elias Tsakas & Nikolas Tsakas & Dimitrios Xefteris, 2021. "Resisting persuasion," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 72(3), pages 723-742, October.
    17. Ludmila Matyskova, 2018. "Bayesian Persuasion with Costly Information Acquisition," CERGE-EI Working Papers wp614, The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economics Institute, Prague.
    18. Alonso, Ricardo & Câmara, Odilon, 2016. "Bayesian persuasion with heterogeneous priors," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 672-706.
    19. Hedlund, Jonas, 2017. "Bayesian persuasion by a privately informed sender," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 167(C), pages 229-268.
    20. Wu, Jiemai, 2020. "Non-competing persuaders," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    21. Hodler, Roland & Loertscher, Simon & Rohner, Dominic, 2014. "Persuasion, binary choice, and the costs of dishonesty," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 124(2), pages 195-198.
    22. Babichenko, Yakov & Talgam-Cohen, Inbal & Xu, Haifeng & Zabarnyi, Konstantin, 2022. "Regret-minimizing Bayesian persuasion," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 226-248.
    23. Hedlund, Jonas, 2014. "Bayesian signaling," Working Papers 0577, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    24. Kolotilin, Anton, 2018. "Optimal information disclosure: a linear programming approach," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 13(2), May.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Information disclosure; Persuasion; Stochastic orders;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C44 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Operations Research; Statistical Decision Theory
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • 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

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