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Harmful choices

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  • Angelo Petralia

Abstract

We investigate the choice behavior of a decision maker (DM) who harms herself, by maximizing in each menu some distortion of her true preference, in which the first i alternatives are moved to the bottom, in a reversed order. The deterministic declination of our pattern has no empirical power, but it allows to define a degree of self-punishment, which measures the extent of the denial of pleasure adopted by the DM in her decision. We analyze irrational choices that display the lowest degree of self-punishment, and a characterization of them is provided. Moreover, we characterize the choice behavior that exhibits the highest degree of self-punishment, and we show that it comprises almost all choices. We also characterize stochastic self-punishment, which collects all the Random Utility Models (RUMs) whose support is restricted to the harmful distortions of some preference. Necessary and sufficient conditions for a full identification of the DM's preference and randomization over its harmful distortions are singled out. Finally, the degree of self-punishment of harmful stochastic choices is characterized.

Suggested Citation

  • Angelo Petralia, 2024. "Harmful choices," Papers 2408.01317, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2024.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2408.01317
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    References listed on IDEAS

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