TY - JOUR
T1 - On the evolution of attitudes towards risk in winner-take-all games
AU - Dekel, Eddie
AU - Scotchmer, Suzanne
N1 - Funding Information:
* We are grateful to Drew Fudenberg, Wulong Gu, Hans Hvide, Arthur Robson, Bill Zame, two referees, and the associate editor for helpful comments. We acknowledge financial support from the NSF, IBER, and Tel Aviv University. -This work was begun while this author was at the University of California at Berkeley.
PY - 1999/7
Y1 - 1999/7
N2 - A long-standing conjecture is that winner-take-all games such as patent races lead to the survival of risk-takers and the extinction of risk-averters. In many species a winner-take-all game determines the males' right to reproduce, and the same argument suggests that males will evolve to be risk-takers. Psychological and sociological evidence buttresses the argument that males are more risk-taking than females. Using an evolutionary model of preference-formation, we investigate to what extent evolution leads to risk-taking in winner-take-all environments. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C7, D8.
AB - A long-standing conjecture is that winner-take-all games such as patent races lead to the survival of risk-takers and the extinction of risk-averters. In many species a winner-take-all game determines the males' right to reproduce, and the same argument suggests that males will evolve to be risk-takers. Psychological and sociological evidence buttresses the argument that males are more risk-taking than females. Using an evolutionary model of preference-formation, we investigate to what extent evolution leads to risk-taking in winner-take-all environments. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C7, D8.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0012332414&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1006/jeth.1999.2537
DO - 10.1006/jeth.1999.2537
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AN - SCOPUS:0012332414
SN - 0022-0531
VL - 87
SP - 125
EP - 143
JO - Journal of Economic Theory
JF - Journal of Economic Theory
IS - 1
ER -
