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This paper presents a theory of behaviour in n-person conflicts. The theory and its solution are predicated on the inter-dependency of coalition formation and pay-off determination in an n-person conflict. The solution, therefore, involves not only pay-off determination but also coalition formation in the game. The theory is developed using mathematical notions of fixed points together with some behavioural theories about choice behaviour and interdependency of persons in competitive situations. It predicts not only the final state of coalition formation but also transient choices and coalitions in the games. Finally, the model is tested on some experimental games of W. Riker. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hostage posting (in the sense of pledging a bond) is a commitment device that allows for cooperation of rational actors in economic and social relations with incentive problems, like in the Prisoner's Dilemma. This paper provides, first, an informal discussion of hostage posting as a mechanism of cooperation. We then analyze noncooperative 2- and n-person games with complete information where players can post a hostage prior to their interaction. We compare rather general hostage 'institutions' that specify the conditions under which hostages are declared forfeited and, if forfeited, whether the hostages are transferred to another player or are lost. The problem of designing efficient hostage institutions is addressed and solved for 2-person settings. The minimal institutional requirement for individually rational hostage posting and subsequent cooperation is, roughly, that a player's hostage is forfeited if hostages have been posted by everyone and if the player deviates unilaterally from cooperation. Furthermore, the hostages posted have to be sufficiently valuable, i.e., match the players' costs of cooperation, and the transaction costs associated with hostage posting have to be sufficiently low. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines Caplow's model of coalitions in the triad and identifies several shortcomings. Retaining the basic structure of Caplow's arguments, it recasts the problem as one of interdependent rational decision making. The reformulation allows increased generality in several directions, including a more general notion of strength, relaxation of the additivity assumption about strength, and the adoption of probabilistic choice to allow predictions about the relative frequencies of the various coalitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Friedkin and Johnsen's interpersonal influence model (Friedkin, 1999; Friedkin and Johnsen, 1999) does not specify the mechanism of social influence, how they affect each other. I introduce some social psychological theories and bring those into Friedkin's model so that the emergence of social influence through the social psychological process is clearly described. At the same time, the possibility of reactance against the persuasion is introduced. Reactance plays a role for the people in the group to have similar but not identical attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During negotiations for coalitions, each actor presumably searches his decision environment for organizing principles--signals--which, if present, would turn the negotiations in his favor. With only one prominent signal, we expect it to determine the nature of agreements, but things may be different with multiple signals. Data from four studies of a weighted-majority game, two using only relative status of winnings in the game as the incentive (i.e., rank position of points accumulated) and two also using monetary reward as an incentive, are analyzed. Both relative status and resources (weights) were apparent to subjects in the studies. Results for coalitions and for payoffs show that a theory based on resources as the signal and one based on status as the signal both separately achieve success in the same bodies of data. As expected, the status-signal theory better predicted coalitions in the two status-reward studies, and the resource-signal theory better predicted in the monetary-reward studies. However, in all four studies, a two-signal model which accounts for the reinforcing effects of signals achieves greater success. This indicates the importance of analyzing actors' adoption of signals into their decision process, particularly in multisignal environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data from 118 members of three consecutive cohorts of students at a private Southern medical school are employed to develop a discrete parameter stationary Markov chains model of the medical specialty choice process. This model was then tested on independent subsamples from the same population, generating a series of predicted specialty choices which did not differ from observed choices by more .than chance expectations. Suggestions for future research, beyond the present demonstration of the utility of a simple Markovian model of a choice process, are offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider a model where the criminal decision of each individual is affected by not only her own characteristics, but also by the characteristics of her friends (contextual effects). We determine who the key player is, i.e., the criminal who once removed generates the highest reduction in total crime in the network. We propose a new measure, the contextual intercentrality measure, that generalizes the one proposed by Ballester, Calvó-Armengol, and Zenou (2006) by taking into account the change in contextual effects following the removal of the key player. We also provide an example showing that the key player can be different whether contextual effects are taken into account or not. This means that the planner may target the wrong person if it ignores the effect of the “context” when removing a criminal from a network. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

We propose a formal-behavioral framework with 3 components: nonselfish motives, expectations about others' nonselfish motives, and a game-theoretic component. For nonselfish motives, 3 nonstandard utility models representing altruism, inequality aversion, and norms are considered. Expectations are modeled as certain versus uncertain expectations. The game-theoretic component predicts behavior of actors and actors' expectations about behaviors of others. This framework is applied to asymmetric one-shot prisoner's dilemmas; predictions are tested experimentally. Formal analyses show that asymmetry provides new predictions through which nonstandard utility-expectation models can be distinguished. Empirical tests show that the inequality aversion model does considerably worse than altruistic and normative variants. Statistical tests for own motives, expected motives, and the association between the two are provided, while accounting for decision noise. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A discrete-time dynamical system is proposed to model a class of binary choice games with externalities as those described by Schelling (1973, 1978). In order to analyze some oscillatory time patterns and problems of equilibrium selection that were not considered in the qualitative analysis given by Schelling, we introduce an explicit adjustment mechanism. We perform a global dynamic analysis that allows us to explain the transition toward nonconnected basins of attraction when several coexisting attractors are present. This gives a formal explanation of some overshooting effects in social systems and of the consequent cyclic behaviors qualitatively described in Schelling (1978). Moreover, we show how the occurrence of a global bifurcation may lead to the explanation of situations of path dependence and the creation of thresholds observed in real life situations of collective choices, leading to extreme forms of irreversible departure from an equilibrium and uncertainty about the long run evolution of the some social systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Axelrod's (1980a, 1980b) Prisoner's Dilemma computer tournaments have motivated numerous investigations of cooperation, strategy choice, and strategic evolution. By having players adopt various strategies for playing the Prisoner's Dilemma, and then programming a computer to pit the strategies against each other in a round-robin format, Axelrod uncovered important principles about the evolution of cooperation in certain contexts, and stimulated others to extend his basic method into other settings. This article presents a matrix approach for calculating the results of an Axelrod-type tournament. This approach allows one to investigate the impact of changes in the format of the tournament, the nature of the payoff matrix, or the particular strategic choices of the players. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-person versions of Prisoner's Dilemma are widely applicable in the social sciences. Examination of two important classes of real-world situations reveals that although both can appropriately be called Prisoner's Dilemma, they have incompatible payoff structures. Thus Prisoner's Dilemma games constitute an important but apparently ambiguous set of models. We therefore undertake a taxonomy of multi-person Prisoner's Dilemma. Some aspects of the well-studied two-person case provide a useful beginning for the task. In the general multi-person form, however, some properties of the two-person game are found incompatible with others and so are dropped. Additional properties are suggested by strategic considerations and the associated social phenomena. We demonstrate interdependencies among the various properties and relate some of them to a simple graphical representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several methods of analyzing the parameters of the Semi-Markov model and incorporating exogeneous information about its states are presented. Regression analysis of parameter estimates and doubly stochastic processes are discussed. Theoretical models for the structure of transition matrices, based on Luce's theory of choice behavior, are derived. Gravity models of varying specificity, useful in the study of migration, are special cases. Maximum likelihood procedures for estimating parameters, with fully operational numerical methods for solution of the likelihood equations, are given. Thus the integration of probabilistic models with theoretical and empirical analysis of causal structure, called for in the previous article, is carried out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]