Effects of Anticipation in Individually Motivated Behaviour on Control and Survival in a Multi-Agent Scenario with Resource Constraints

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY 3.0 which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Self-organization and survival are inextricably bound to an agent’s ability to control and anticipate its environment. Here we assess both skills when multiple agents compete for a scarce resource. Drawing on insights from psychology, microsociology and control theory, we examine how different assumptions about the behaviour of an agent’s peers in the anticipation process affect subjective control and survival strategies. To quantify control and drive behaviour, we use the recently developed information-theoretic quantity of empowerment with the principle of empowerment maximization. In two experiments involving extensive simulations, we show that agents develop risk-seeking, risk-averse and mixed strategies, which correspond to greedy, parsimonious and mixed behaviour. Although the principle of empowerment maximization is highly generic, the emerging strategies are consistent with what one would expect from rational individuals with dedicated utility models. Our results support empowerment maximization as a universal drive for guided self-organization in collective agent systemsPeer reviewedFinal Published versio

The Value of Stock Options To Non-Executive Employees

This study empirically investigates the value employees place on stock options using information from the option exercise behavior of individuals. Employees hold options for another period if the value from holding them and reserving the right to exercise them later is higher than the value of exercising them immediately and collecting a profit equal to the stock price minus the exercise price. This simple model implies the hazard describing employee exercise behavior reveals information about the value to employees of holding options another time period. We show the parameters of this model are identified with data on multiple option grants per employee and we apply this model to the disposition of options received in the 1990s by a sample of over 2000 middle-level managers from a large, established firm outside of manufacturing. Exercise behavior is modeled using a random effects probit model of monthly exercise behavior that is estimated using simulated maximum likelihood estimation methods. Our estimates show there is substantial heterogeneity (observed and unobserved) among employees in the value they place on their options. Our estimates show most employees value their options at a value greater than the option’s Black-Scholes value

Behavioral Approaches to Corporate Law

This chapter reviews the challenges associated with developing a plausible theory of why psychological heuristics and biases might persist in high-stakes business settings. Specific attention is given to issues of loyalty on corporate boards, behavioral finance, and corporate cultures

Dynamics of banking technology adoption: an application to internet banking

This paper is concerned with examining behaviour of firms (banks) and consumers (banks’ customers) in the event of a new technology (internet banking) introduction. The determinants of consumer adoption of internet banking are characterised using survey data from Korea in both static and dynamic framework. I find evidence that adoption of internet banking is influenced by sex, age, marital status, degree of exposure to internet banking, and the characteristics of the banks. A duration analysis shows no evidence of first mover advantage (order effects) in internet banking whilst the largest bank (rank effects) in commercial banking remains dominant in internet banking. The results imply that the internet banking adoption is dominated by social norm effects

Justice and the fetus: rawls, children, and abortion

In a footnote to the first edition of Political Liberalism, John Rawls introduced an example of how public reason could deal with controversial issues. He intended this example to show that his system of political liberalism could deal with such problems by considering only political values, without the introduction of comprehensive moral doctrines. Unfortunately, Rawls chose “the troubled question of abortion” as the issue that would illustrate this. In the case of abortion, Rawls argued, “the equality of women as equal citizens” overrides both “the ordered reproduction of political society over time” and also “the due respect for human life.” It seems fair to say that this was not the best choice of example and also that Rawls did not argue for his example particularly well: a whole subset of the Rawlsian literature concerns this question alone

On a Failed Defense of Factory Farming

Timothy Hsiao attempts to defend industrial animal farming by arguing that it is not inherently cruel. We raise three main objections to his defense. First, his argument rests on a misunderstanding of the nature of cruelty. Second, his conclusion, though technically true, is so weak as to be of virtually no moral significance or interest. Third, his contention that animals lack moral standing, and thus that mistreating them is wrong only insofar as it makes one more disposed to mistreat other humans, is untenable on both philosophical and biological grounds

A Theory of Natural Addiction

Economic theories of rational addiction aim to describe consumer behavior in the presence of habit-forming goods. We provide a biological foundation for this body of work by formally specifying conditions under which it is optimal to form a habit. We demonstrate the empirical validity of our thesis with an in-depth review and synthesis of the biomedical literature concerning the action of opiates in the mammalian brain and their eects on behavior. Our results lend credence to many of the unconventional behavioral assumptions employed by theories of rational addiction, including adjacent complementarity and the importance of cues, attention, and self-control in determining the behavior of addicts. We oer evidence for the special case of the opiates that "harmful" addiction is the manifestation of a mismatch between behavioral algorithms encoded in the human genome and the expanded menu of choices faced by consumers in the modern world

Facilitating Meaningful Change Within U.S. Law Schools

Despite the widely recognized challenges and complaints facing U.S. legal education, very little is understood about how law schools can adapt faster and better. This Article uses institutional theory, behavioral economics, and psychology to explain why change has proven so difficult for U.S. law schools. Next, using institutional entrepreneurship, the Article explains the theoretical steps necessary to overcome the institutional resistance to change. The Article then discusses the characteristics of opportunities that are most likely to better meet the needs of law students while also providing sustainable benefits to the individually innovating law schools. Using management theory, the Article then proposes a seven-step change process model to enable individual law schools to systematically overcome institutional resistance, formulate unique strategies, and actually achieve meaningful change

Expected Return of Housing and Mortgage Termination

The prepayment risk of adjustable rate mortgages, unlike that of fixed rate mortgages, greatly depends on the decision of mortgagors to move. Given that housing also serves as an investment asset for the owner, it is hypothesised that the expected capital returns of housing are likely to affect his decision to move and hence, prepay. This paper aims to test the capital gains hypothesis using Singapore’s housing market as a case study. In addition, this paper also explores how the expected returns from alternative types of housing affect the decision of households to move/prepay. The expected returns of housing are computed in accordance with the definitions of the Rational Expectation Hypothesis, Adaptive Expectation Hypothesis, and Exogenous Expectation Hypothesis, which are well established in macroeconomic literature and the explanation of cycles. The results showed that the expected returns of public housing formed under the assumptions of rational and adaptive expectation hypothesis are significant. The rational expected return for private housing, however, does not have a significant relationship with the decision of mortgagors to move/prepay, although the adapted expected return for private housing is not significantly related to the households’ length of stay.Expected Returns, Prepayment