Skip to main content

Lund University Publications

LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Categorization in Games: A Bias-Variance Perspective

Jehiel, Philippe and Mohlin, Erik LU (2025) In Working Papers
Abstract
We develop a framework for categorization in games, applicable both to multistage
games of complete information and static games of incomplete information.
Players use categories to form coarse beliefs about their opponents’
behavior. Players best-respond given these beliefs, as in analogy-based expectations
equilibria. Categories are related to strategies via the requirements
that categories contain a sufficient amount of observations and exhibit sufficient
within-category similarity, in line with the bias-variance trade-off. We apply
our framework to classic games including the chainstore game and adverse selection
games, thereby suggesting novel predictions for these applications.
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
and
organization
publishing date
type
Working paper/Preprint
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Bounded rationality, Categorization, Bias-variance trade-off, Adverse selection, Chainstore parado, C70, C73, D82, D83, D91
in
Working Papers
issue
2025:7
pages
66 pages
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
023b8120-ad47-4c69-bdf9-dd199412d0a6
date added to LUP
2025-09-09 13:39:40
date last changed
2025-09-09 13:39:40
@misc{023b8120-ad47-4c69-bdf9-dd199412d0a6,
  abstract     = {{We develop a framework for categorization in games, applicable both to multistage<br/>games of complete information and static games of incomplete information.<br/>Players use categories to form coarse beliefs about their opponents’<br/>behavior. Players best-respond given these beliefs, as in analogy-based expectations<br/>equilibria. Categories are related to strategies via the requirements<br/>that categories contain a sufficient amount of observations and exhibit sufficient<br/>within-category similarity, in line with the bias-variance trade-off. We apply<br/>our framework to classic games including the chainstore game and adverse selection<br/>games, thereby suggesting novel predictions for these applications.}},
  author       = {{Jehiel, Philippe and Mohlin, Erik}},
  keywords     = {{Bounded rationality; Categorization; Bias-variance trade-off; Adverse selection; Chainstore parado; C70; C73; D82; D83; D91}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Working Paper}},
  number       = {{2025:7}},
  series       = {{Working Papers}},
  title        = {{Categorization in Games: A Bias-Variance Perspective}},
  url          = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/227310315/WP25_7.pdf}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}