IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jeborg/v159y2019icp235-253.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Failure of the Becker–DeGroot–Marschak mechanism in inexperienced subjects: New tests of the game form misconception hypothesis

Author

Listed:
  • Bull, Charles
  • Courty, Pascal
  • Doyon, Maurice
  • Rondeau, Daniel

Abstract

Cason and Plott (2014, hereafter CP) conclude that sub-optimal behavior in the (second price) Becker-DeGroot-Marschak mechanism (BDM) is consistent with the hypothesis that a significant proportion of subjects misconceive the BDM as a first price auction. We broadly replicate CP’s results, formalize a game form recognition theory for the analysis of treatment effects, and explore the robustness of CP’s conclusions across four treatments. We conclude that the pattern of misconception that explains the BDM data cannot simultaneously explain observed choices in closely related treatments.

Suggested Citation

  • Bull, Charles & Courty, Pascal & Doyon, Maurice & Rondeau, Daniel, 2019. "Failure of the Becker–DeGroot–Marschak mechanism in inexperienced subjects: New tests of the game form misconception hypothesis," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 235-253.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:159:y:2019:i:c:p:235-253
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2019.01.003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268119300046
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jebo.2019.01.003?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Noussair, Charles & Robin, Stephane & Ruffieux, Bernard, 2004. "Revealing consumers' willingness-to-pay: A comparison of the BDM mechanism and the Vickrey auction," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 725-741, December.
    2. Riccardo Vecchio & Azzurra Annunziata, 2015. "The effect of monetary versus nonmonetary endowment on WTP in BDM auctions," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(2), pages 137-140, January.
    3. E. Elisabet RutstrÃm, 1998. "Home-grown values and incentive compatible auction design," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 27(3), pages 427-441.
    4. Simone Quercia, 2016. "Eliciting and measuring betrayal aversion using the BDM mechanism," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 2(1), pages 48-59, May.
    5. Cubitt, Robin & Gächter, Simon & Quercia, Simone, 2017. "Conditional cooperation and betrayal aversion," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 110-121.
    6. James Berry & Greg Fischer & Raymond Guiteras, 2020. "Eliciting and Utilizing Willingness to Pay: Evidence from Field Trials in Northern Ghana," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(4), pages 1436-1473.
    7. Maren Duvendack & Richard Palmer-Jones & W. Robert Reed, 2017. "What Is Meant by "Replication" and Why Does It Encounter Resistance in Economics?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 46-51, May.
    8. Harrison, Glenn W, 1990. "Risk Attitudes in First-Price Auction Experiments: A Bayesian Analysis," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(3), pages 541-546, August.
    9. Kagel, John H & Levin, Dan, 1993. "Independent Private Value Auctions: Bidder Behaviour in First-, Second- and Third-Price Auctions with Varying Numbers of Bidders," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 103(419), pages 868-879, July.
    10. Kahneman, Daniel & Knetsch, Jack L & Thaler, Richard H, 1990. "Experimental Tests of the Endowment Effect and the Coase Theorem," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(6), pages 1325-1348, December.
    11. Fehr, Dietmar & Hakimov, Rustamdjan & Kübler, Dorothea, 2015. "The willingness to pay–willingness to accept gap: A failed replication of Plott and Zeiler," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 120-128.
    12. Binmore, Ken & Shaked, Avner, 2010. "Experimental economics: Where next?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 87-100, January.
    13. Jonathan E. Alevy & Craig E. Landry & John A. List, 2015. "Field Experiments On The Anchoring Of Economic Valuations," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 53(3), pages 1522-1538, July.
    14. Karni, Edi & Safra, Zvi, 1987. ""Preference Reversal' and the Observability of Preferences by Experimental Methods," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(3), pages 675-685, May.
    15. Jayson L. Lusk & John A. Fox & Ted C. Schroeder & James Mintert & Mohammad Koohmaraie, 2001. "In-Store Valuation of Steak Tenderness," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 83(3), pages 539-550.
    16. Zacharias Maniadis & Fabio Tufano & John A. List, 2014. "One Swallow Doesn't Make a Summer: New Evidence on Anchoring Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 104(1), pages 277-290, January.
    17. Eileen Chou & Margaret McConnell & Rosemarie Nagel & Charles Plott, 2009. "The control of game form recognition in experiments: understanding dominant strategy failures in a simple two person “guessing” game," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 12(2), pages 159-179, June.
    18. Björn Bartling & Florian Engl & Roberto A. Weber, 2015. "Game form misconceptions are not necessary for a willingness-to-pay vs. willingness-to-accept gap," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 72-85, July.
    19. Sotiris Georganas & Dan Levin & Peter McGee, 2017. "Optimistic irrationality and overbidding in private value auctions," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 20(4), pages 772-792, December.
    20. Andrew C. Chang & Phillip Li, 2017. "A Preanalysis Plan to Replicate Sixty Economics Research Papers That Worked Half of the Time," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 60-64, May.
    21. Charles R. Plott & Kathryn Zeiler, 2011. "The Willingness to Pay--Willingness to Accept Gap, the "Endowment Effect," Subject Misconceptions, and Experimental Procedures for Eliciting Valuations: Reply," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(2), pages 1012-1028, April.
    22. Colin F. Camerer & Anna Dreber & Felix Holzmeister & Teck-Hua Ho & Jürgen Huber & Magnus Johannesson & Michael Kirchler & Gideon Nave & Brian A. Nosek & Thomas Pfeiffer & Adam Altmejd & Nick Buttrick , 2018. "Evaluating the replicability of social science experiments in Nature and Science between 2010 and 2015," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 2(9), pages 637-644, September.
    23. Charles R. Plott & Kathryn Zeiler, 2005. "The Willingness to Pay–Willingness to Accept Gap, the "Endowment Effect," Subject Misconceptions, and Experimental Procedures for Eliciting Valuations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(3), pages 530-545, June.
    24. Horowitz, John K., 2006. "The Becker-DeGroot-Marschak mechanism is not necessarily incentive compatible, even for non-random goods," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 6-11, October.
    25. Camerer, Colin & Dreber, Anna & Forsell, Eskil & Ho, Teck-Hua & Huber, Jurgen & Johannesson, Magnus & Kirchler, Michael & Almenberg, Johan & Altmejd, Adam & Chan, Taizan & Heikensten, Emma & Holzmeist, 2016. "Evaluating replicability of laboratory experiments in Economics," MPRA Paper 75461, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    26. Freeman, David & Manzini, Paola & Mariotti, Marco & Mittone, Luigi, 2016. "Procedures for eliciting time preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 126(PA), pages 235-242.
    27. Binmore, Ken & Shaked, Avner, 2010. "Experimental Economics: Where Next? Rejoinder," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 120-121, January.
    28. Andrea Isoni & Graham Loomes & Robert Sugden, 2011. "The Willingness to Pay—Willingness to Accept Gap, the "Endowment Effect," Subject Misconceptions, and Experimental Procedures for Eliciting Valuations: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(2), pages 991-1011, April.
    29. Boyce, Rebecca R, et al, 1992. "An Experimental Examination of Intrinsic Values as a," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(5), pages 1366-1373, December.
    30. Bohm, Peter & Linden, Johan & Sonnegard, Joakim, 1997. "Eliciting Reservation Prices: Becker-DeGroot-Marschak Mechanisms vs. Markets," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 107(443), pages 1079-1089, July.
    31. Timothy N. Cason & Charles R. Plott, 2014. "Misconceptions and Game Form Recognition: Challenges to Theories of Revealed Preference and Framing," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 122(6), pages 1235-1270.
    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. Siemroth, Christoph & Hornuf, Lars, 2023. "Why Do Retail Investors Pick Green Investments? A Lab-in-the-Field Experiment with Crowdfunders," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 74-90.
    2. Maximilian Spath, 2023. "The qualitative accuracy of the Becker-DeGroot-Marshak method," Papers 2302.04055, arXiv.org.
    3. Drichoutis, Andreas C. & Nayga, Rodolfo M., 2022. "Game form recognition in preference elicitation, cognitive abilities, and cognitive load," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 193(C), pages 49-65.
    4. Martin, Daniel & Muñoz-Rodriguez, Edwin, 2022. "Cognitive costs and misperceived incentives: Evidence from the BDM mechanism," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 148(C).

    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. Maurizio Canavari & Andreas C. Drichoutis & Jayson L. Lusk & Rodolfo M. Nayga, Jr., 2018. "How to run an experimental auction: A review of recent advances," Working Papers 2018-5, Agricultural University of Athens, Department Of Agricultural Economics.
    2. Parkhurst, Gregory M. & Nowell, Clifford, 2014. "The Role of Confidence in Truthful Revelation of Private Values," Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, Northeastern Agricultural and Resource Economics Association, vol. 0, pages 1-16.
    3. Brebner, Sarah & Sonnemans, Joep, 2018. "Does the elicitation method impact the WTA/WTP disparity?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 40-45.
    4. James C. Cox & Vjollca Sadiraj, 2018. "Incentives," Experimental Economics Center Working Paper Series 2018-01, Experimental Economics Center, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    5. Sebastian Lehmann, 2014. "Toward an Understanding of the BDM: Predictive Validity, Gambling Effects, and Risk Attitude," FEMM Working Papers 150001, Otto-von-Guericke University Magdeburg, Faculty of Economics and Management.
    6. Fehr, Dietmar & Hakimov, Rustamdjan & Kübler, Dorothea, 2015. "The willingness to pay–willingness to accept gap: A failed replication of Plott and Zeiler," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 120-128.
    7. James Berry & Greg Fischer & Raymond Guiteras, 2020. "Eliciting and Utilizing Willingness to Pay: Evidence from Field Trials in Northern Ghana," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(4), pages 1436-1473.
    8. Maximilian Spath, 2023. "The qualitative accuracy of the Becker-DeGroot-Marshak method," Papers 2302.04055, arXiv.org.
    9. Jiqiang Wang & Fu Gu & Yingpeng Liu & Ying Fan & Jianfeng Guo, 2020. "An Endowment Effect Study in the European Union Emission Trading Market based on Trading Price and Price Fluctuation," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(9), pages 1-13, May.
    10. Oben K Bayrak & Bengt Kriström, 2016. "Is there a valuation gap? The case of interval valuations," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(1), pages 218-236.
    11. Samir Mamadehussene & Francesco Sguera, 2023. "On the Reliability of the BDM Mechanism," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(2), pages 1166-1179, February.
    12. Eszter Czibor & David Jimenez‐Gomez & John A. List, 2019. "The Dozen Things Experimental Economists Should Do (More of)," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 86(2), pages 371-432, October.
    13. Isabel Marcin & Andreas Nicklisch, 2014. "Testing the Endowment Effect for Default Rules," Discussion Paper Series of the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods 2014_01, Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.
    14. Rosato, Antonio & Tymula, Agnieszka A., 2019. "Loss aversion and competition in Vickrey auctions: Money ain't no good," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 188-208.
    15. Gächter, Simon & Kölle, Felix & Quercia, Simone, 2022. "Preferences and perceptions in Provision and Maintenance public goods," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 338-355.
    16. Jonathan Chapman & Pietro Ortoleva & Erik Snowberg & Colin Camerer & Mark Dean, 2017. "Willingness-To-Pay and Willingness-To-Accept are Probably Less Correlated than You Think," CESifo Working Paper Series 6492, CESifo.
    17. Drouvelis, Michalis & Sonnemans, Joep, 2017. "The endowment effect in games," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 240-262.
    18. Cubitt, Robin & Gächter, Simon & Quercia, Simone, 2017. "Conditional cooperation and betrayal aversion," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 110-121.
    19. Rosato, Antonio & Tymula, Agnieszka A., 2024. "A novel experimental test of truthful bidding in second-price auctions with real objects," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    20. Marcin, Isabel & Nicklisch, Andreas, 2014. "Testing the Endowment Effect for Default Rules," WiSo-HH Working Paper Series 10, University of Hamburg, Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences, WISO Research Laboratory.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Experiment; Game form recognition; Game form misconception; Mistake; Becker–DeGroot–Marschak; Preference elicitation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C8 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology; Computer Programs
    • C9 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments

    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:jeborg:v:159:y:2019:i:c:p:235-253. 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/jebo .

    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.