CeDEx Seminar - Benjamin Bushong (Michigan State University)

Social (Mis)Learning with Heterogeneous Tastes: Framework and Experimental Evidence

Abstract:

How do we learn from others’ actions when they have different preferences or tastes? Using a series of experiments, we demonstrate that people err in such learning: they misinterpret others’ actions as if others shared their tastes, even when credibly informed that they do not. This misinterpretation leads to erroneous inference from actions and misinference about common values.