Fooling some of the people some of the time: reputation management and optimal betrayal

Working paper

A rational long lived player plays against a series of short lived players who use a variant of the Adaptive Play behavioral rule. In equilibrium, under certain conditions, there will be a cut-off level of reputation. If their reputation is below the cut-off, they will build their reputation, and consume out of their reputation if it is above the cut-off. Over the long run, their reputation oscillates around the cut-off. A public relations professional can manipulate the sampling of the short lived players to the benefit of the long lived player. As a result a patient long lived player's behavior will worsen while an impatient long lived player's behavior will improve.

Authors: Mell, A

• Publication status: Published
• Publisher: University of Oxford
• Series: Department of Economics Discussion Paper Series
• Publication date: 2015-12-03
• Paper number: 770
• Keywords: monitoring; reputation; adaptive play; expectation formation