This paper examines the occurrence and fragility of information cascades in laboratory experiments.One group of low informed subjects make predictions in sequence. In a matchedpairs design, another set of high informed subjects observe the decisions of the first group andmake predictions....

We investigate the effect of absence of common knowledge on the outcomes of coordination games in a laboratory experiment. Using cognitive types, we can explain coordination failure in pure coordination games while differentiating between coordination failure due to first- and higher-order...

In economic environments, decision-makers can strategically delay irreversible investments to learn from the actions of others. This creates free-riding incentives and can lead to socially suboptimal outcomes. We experimentally examine if and how communication mitigates this free-riding problem...

We analyze an experimental public goods game in which group members can endogenously determine whether they want to supplement a standard voluntary contribution mechanism with the possibility of rewarding or punishing other group members. We find a large and positive effect of endogenous...

We study the stability of voluntary cooperation in response to varying rates at which a group grows. Using a laboratory public-good game with voluntary contributions and economies of scale, we construct a situation in which expanding a group's size yields potential efficiency gains, but only if...

This paper studies the effect of endogenous group formation on the outcome in two types of coordination games with multiple Pareto-ranked equilibria. Endogenous group formation means that in each period players are free to choose among two or more groups within which they want to play the...

This paper examines behavior (the oretically and experimentally) in a two-stage group contest where the fi rst stage comprises of intra - group contests, followed by an inter-group contest in the second stage. Rewards accrue only to the members of the winning group in the inter-group contest,...

There are situations in which competitors ally to pursue a common objective. This simultaneous presence of cooperation and competition is called coopetition and we study it theoretically and experimentally in a group contest setup. More concretely, we analyze a group contest with a new sharing...

We experimentally study behavior in a simple voting game where players have private information about their preferences. With random matching, subjects overwhelmingly follow the dominant strategy to exaggerate their preferences, which leads to inefficiency. We analyze an exogenous linking...

In this paper we test the effect of descriptive "features" on initial strategic behavior in normal form games, where "descriptive" are all those features that can be modified without altering the (Nash) equilibrium structure of a game. We observe that our experimental subjects behave according...