Related papers: When abstinence increases prevalence
In search engines, online marketplaces and other human-computer interfaces large collectives of individuals sequentially interact with numerous alternatives of varying quality. In these contexts, trial and error (exploration) is crucial for…
We provide a unifying way to analyze how risk aversion changes bidding in auctions by asking which bids become more attractive as bidders become more risk averse. In first-price auctions, under two payoff conditions--winning is never worse…
This paper analyses how risk-taking behaviour and preferences over consumption rank can emerge as a neutrally stable equilibrium when individuals face an anti-coordination task. If in an otherwise homogeneous society information about…
We interpret attitudes towards science and pseudosciences as cultural traits that diffuse in society through communication efforts exerted by agents. We present a tractable model that allows us to study the interaction among the diffusion…
Anti-retroviral drugs can reduce the infectiousness of people living with HIV by about 96%--treatment as prevention or TasP--and can reduce the risk of being infected by an HIV positive person by about 70%--pre-exposure prophylaxis or…
Contest participants often have strong incentives to engage in cheating. Sanctions serve as a common deterrent against such conduct. Often, other agents on the contestant's team (e.g., a coach of an athlete) or a company (a manager of an…
We study the dating market decision problem in which men and women repeatedly go out on dates and learn about each other. We consider a model for the dating market that takes into account progressive mutual learning. This model consists of…
The commonly observed negative correlation between the number of species in an ecological community and disease risk, typically referred to as "the dilution effect", has received a substantial amount of attention over the past decade.…
The spread of certain diseases can be promoted, in some cases substantially, by prior infection with another disease. One example is that of HIV, whose immunosuppressant effects significantly increase the chances of infection with other…
Is homophily in social and economic networks driven by a taste for homogeneity (preferences) or by a higher probability of meeting individuals with similar attributes (opportunity)? This paper studies identification and estimation of an…
Cooperation is ubiquitous ranging from multicellular organisms to human societies. Population structures indicating individuals' limited interaction ranges are crucial to understand this issue. But it is still at large to what extend…
We show that if the exposure and the outcome affect the selection indicator in the same direction and have non-positive interaction on the risk difference, risk ratio or odds ratio scale, the exposure-outcome odds ratio in the selected…
Cooperation is fundamental to the evolution of human society. We regularly observe cooperative behaviour in everyday life and in controlled experiments with anonymous people, even though standard economic models predict that they should…
Physical contacts do not occur randomly, rather, individuals with similar socio-demographic and behavioural characteristics are more likely to interact among them, a phenomenon known as homophily. Concurrently, the same characteristics…
Much has been debated about the benefit of sexual over asexual reproduction in terms of evolutionary fitness. Here we focus on the advantage that may be brought about by the process of mating, where the choosing of mates contributes to the…
People are influenced by the choices of others, a phenomenon observed across contexts in the social and behavioral sciences. Social influence can lock in an initial popularity advantage of an option over a higher quality alternative. Yet…
We create a network model to study the spread of an epidemic through physically proximate and accidental daily human contacts in a city, and simulate outcomes for two kinds of agents - poor and non-poor. Under non-intervention, peak…
Evolutionary game theory assumes that individuals maximize their benefits when choosing strategies. However, an alternative perspective proposes that individuals seek to maximize the benefits of others. To explore the relationship between…
Mathematical models are increasing adopted for setting targets for disease prevention and control. As model-informed policies are implemented, however, the inaccuracies of some forecasts become apparent, for example overprediction of…
Under panicky situation, human have tendency to rush toward a particular direction for escape. I show here that this tendency alone causes increase in crowding and which could eventually trigger jamming that is not preferable. Further, it…