Information AcquisitionAlessandro Lizzeri (Princeton)

6 May 2021

We welcome Alessandro Lizzeri (Princeton) who will present his project on

"Information Acquisition"

Abstract: Many committees—juries, political task forces, etc.—spend time gathering costly information before reaching a decision. We report results from lab experiments focused on such information collection processes. We consider decisions governed by individuals and groups and compare how voting rules affect outcomes. We also contrast static information collection, as in classical hypothesis testing, with dynamic collection, as in sequential hypothesis testing. Generally, outcomes approximate the theoretical benchmark and sequential information collection is welfare enhancing relative to static collection. Nonetheless, several important departures emerge. Static information collection is excessive, and sequential information collection is non-stationary, producing declining decision accuracies over time. Furthermore, groups using majority rule yield especially hasty and inaccurate decisions.

Place: Zoom (please contact us - gero.henseler"AT"uni-hamburg.de or huyen.nguyen-1"AT"uni.hamburg.de - for the login information)
Time: 17:15 - 18:45
We invite everyone interested to attend!