Learning under Diverse World Views: Model-Based Inference

S-Tier
Journal: American Economic Review
Year: 2020
Volume: 110
Issue: 5
Pages: 1464-1501

Authors (2)

Score contribution per author:

4.022 = (α=2.01 / 2 authors) × 4.0x S-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

People reason about uncertainty with deliberately incomplete models. How do people hampered by different, incomplete views of the world learn from each other? We introduce a model of "model-based inference." Model-based reasoners partition an otherwise hopelessly complex state space into a manageable model. Unless the differences in agents' models are trivial, interactions will often not lead agents to have common beliefs or beliefs near the correct-model belief. If the agents' models have enough in common, then interacting will lead agents to similar beliefs, even if their models also exhibit some bizarre idiosyncrasies and their information is widely dispersed.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:aea:aecrev:v:110:y:2020:i:5:p:1464-1501
Journal Field
General
Author Count
2
Added to Database
2026-01-25