A note on uncertainty and cooperation in a finitely repeated prisoner's dilemma
type: Item
instance of: scholarly article
title: A note on uncertainty and cooperation in a finitely repeated prisoner's dilemma
zbMATH Open document ID: 0631.90099
DOI: 10.1007/BF01756290
author: Larry Samuelson
published in: International Journal of Game Theory
publication date: 1987-01-01T00:00:00Z
review text: An intuitive expectation is that in a finitely repeated prisoner's dilemma, the players will achieve mutual cooperation in at least some periods. Existing explanations for equilibrium cooperation (with agents perfectly informed of one another's characteristics) require that the number of repetitions be unknown, which is in many cases an uncomfortably strong uncertainty assertion. This paper demonstrates that if agents have private information concerning the number of repetitions (as opposed to being completely uninformed), equilibrium mutual cooperation can occur in a finitely repeated game. This appears to be a weaker and more palatable assumption than that of complete uncertainty, and hence provides a natural and useful alternative foundation for mutual cooperation.
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 91A20
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 91A12
zbMATH DE Number: 4027224
zbMATH Keywords: finitely repeated prisoner's dilemma
zbMATH Keywords: equilibrium cooperation
zbMATH Keywords: private information
MaRDI profile type: Publication
cites work: Q3254691
cites work: Finitely Repeated Games
cites work: A Non-cooperative Equilibrium for Supergames
cites work: Rational cooperation in the finitely repeated prisoners' dilemma
cites work: Sequential Equilibria
cites work: Q3252269
cites work: An Axiomatic Characterization of Common Knowledge
cites work: Q3335556
cites work: Optimal cartel trigger price strategies
cites work: Collusive behavior in noncooperative epsilon-equilibria of oligopolies with long but finite lives
cites work: New equilibria for noncooperative two‐person games
cites work: Equilibrium in supergames with the overtaking criterion
cites work: Strong perfect equilibrium in supergames
cites work: Bayesian games as stochastic processes
cites work: Reexamination of the perfectness concept for equilibrium points in extensive games
cites work: The chain store paradox
cites work: The Prisoner's Dilemma and Dynamical Systems Associated to Non-Cooperative Games
full work available at URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01756290
OpenAlex ID: W2095342151
Recommended article: Finite rationalizability and cooperation in the finitely repeated prisoners' dilemma
Recommended article: Cooperation in the infinitely repeated prisoners' dilemma with perturbations
Recommended article: Cooperation in the Finitely Repeated Prisoner’s Dilemma*
Recommended article: An epistemic approach to explaining cooperation in the finitely repeated Prisoner's dilemma
Recommended article: Explaining cooperation in the finitely repeated simultaneous and sequential prisoner’s dilemma game under incomplete and complete information
Recommended article: Q5393060
Recommended article: On the iterated prisoner's dilemma in a finite population
Recommended article: Reciprocal cooperation in the prisoner's dilemma repeated with random horizon
Recommended article: Finite cooperative games with a parametric concept of equilibrium under uncertainty conditions
Recommended article: Q4433170
description: scientific article; zbMATH DE number 4027224