Title: Information Disclosure in a Supermodular Game

Speaker: Du Ninghua, Tenured Professor and Director of the Department of Microeconomics, School of Economics, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics; Executive Chairman of the 3rd "China Forum on Behavioral and Experimental Economics". He obtained a doctoral degree in economics from the University of Arizona, USA in 2005. His main research field is behavioral and experimental economics. In recent years, he has been committed to using empirical methods of experimental economics to investigate basic issues of behavioral mechanism design and conduct in-depth discussions on market mechanisms. His research results have been published in top international management journals such as Management Science, first-class international economics journals including Games and Economic Behavior and European Economic Review, as well as well-known international economics and management journals such as Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics and Decision Support Systems.

Abstract: We experimentally study the effectiveness of information disclosure in a binary-action supermodular game with state-dependent payoff. An information designer, who observes the state, aims to maximize the choice of high (instead of low) action by the players who are unaware of the state. The players prefer the high action when the state is 'favorable'; when it's 'unfavorable', they prefer the low action. The designer utilizes information disclosure to induce high action. We find in the experiment that, compared to no disclosure, both truthful and persuasive disclosures can raise frequency of the high action. We also find that, contrary to predictions, persuasive disclosure fails to be better than truthful disclosure.

Date & time: 21 April 2025, 10:00

Venue: B609, Yifu Information Building, Central Campus, Shandong University