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Evolution of Preferences1
EDDIE DEKEL a , JEFFREY C. ELY b OKAN YILANKAYA c
  a Northwestern University and Tel Aviv University
  b Northwestern University
  c University of British Columbia
Copyright 2007 The Review of Economic Studies Limited

ABSTRACT

We endogenize preferences using the "indirect evolutionary approach". Individuals are randomly matched to play a two-person game. Individual (subjective) preferences determine their behaviour and may differ from the actual (objective) pay-offs that determine fitness. Matched individuals may observe the opponents' preferences perfectly, not at all, or with some in-between probability. When preferences are observable, a stable outcome must be efficient. When they are not observable, a stable outcome must be a Nash equilibrium and all strict equilibria are stable. We show that, for pure-strategy outcomes, these conclusions are robust to allowing almost perfect, and almost no, observability, with the notable exception that inefficient strict equilibria may fail to be stable with any arbitrarily small degree of observability (despite being stable with no observability).


First version received June 2004; final version accepted July 2006 (Eds.)

DIGITAL OBJECT IDENTIFIER (DOI)
10.1111/j.1467-937X.2007.00445.x About DOI

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