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Related papers: Principal-Agent Hypothesis Testing

200 papers

A principal and $n\ge 2$ agents can launch a project if the principal proposes it and at least $k$ agents accept. Their individual payoffs from the project depend on an ex ante unknown state. The principal can conduct a test to learn about…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-05-06 Zhicheng Du , Yingkai Li , Boli Xu

This work considers a repeated principal-agent bandit game, where the principal can only interact with her environment through the agent. The principal and the agent have misaligned objectives and the choice of action is only left to the…

In the classical principal-agent hidden-action contract model, a principal delegates the execution of a costly task to an agent. In order to complete the task, the agent chooses an action from a set of actions, where each potential action…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-11-27 Tomer Ezra , Stefano Leonardi , Matteo Russo

We study hidden-action principal-agent problems in which a principal commits to an outcome-dependent payment scheme (called contract) so as to incentivize the agent to take a costly, unobservable action leading to favorable outcomes. In…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2022-08-18 Matteo Castiglioni , Alberto Marchesi , Nicola Gatti

A principal must decide between two options. Which one she prefers depends on the private information of two agents. One agent always prefers the first option; the other always prefers the second. Transfers are infeasible. One application…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2022-05-24 Deniz Kattwinkel , Axel Niemeyer , Justus Preusser , Alexander Winter

We study a setting in which a principal selects an agent to execute a collection of tasks according to a specified priority sequence. Agents, however, have their own individual priority sequences according to which they wish to execute the…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-10-30 Donya G. Dobakhshari , Lav R. Varshney , Vijay Gupta

An analyst is tasked with producing a statistical study. The analyst is not monitored and is able to manipulate the study. He can receive payments contingent on his report and trusted data collected from an independent source, modeled as a…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-10-02 Yaron Azrieli , Christopher Chambers , Paul Healy , Nicolas Lambert

We often assume that agent-to-agent interaction will mirror human conversation. However, agents operate fundamentally differently. What if they could develop communication patterns that are more efficient and better aligned with their…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-02-03 Marco De Rossi

We consider a principal agent project selection problem with asymmetric information. There are $N$ projects and the principal must select exactly one of them. Each project provides some profit to the principal and some payoff to the agent…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-04-15 Sumit Goel , Wade Hann-Caruthers

How to optimally persuade an agent who has a private type? When elicitation is feasible, this amounts to a fairly standard principal-agent-style mechanism design problem, where the persuader employs a mechanism to first elicit the agent's…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-11-01 Jiarui Gan , Abheek Ghosh , Nicholas Teh

There is growing concern about tacit collusion using algorithmic pricing, and regulators need tools to help detect the possibility of such collusion. This paper studies how to design a hypothesis testing framework in order to decide whether…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2020-03-31 Pedro Hespanhol , Anil Aswani

Agents are systems that optimize an objective function in an environment. Together, the goal and the environment induce secondary objectives, incentives. Modeling the agent-environment interaction using causal influence diagrams, we can…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2022-01-21 Tom Everitt , Pedro A. Ortega , Elizabeth Barnes , Shane Legg

We propose a new principal-agent framework where a principal communicates a roadmap -- a set of plausible outcome models and a prior belief over them -- to guide an agent who is learning the value of innovation. The agent trusts the prior…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-02-24 Florian Mudekereza

We investigate the impact of a regulation policy imposed on an agent exploiting a possibly renewable natural resource. We adopt a principal-agent model in which the Principal looks for a contract, i.e. taxes/compensations, leading the Agent…

Probability · Mathematics 2019-06-06 Idris Kharroubi , Thomas Lim , Thibaut Mastrolia

Pragmatic randomized trials are designed to provide evidence for clinical decision-making rather than regulatory approval. Common features of these trials include the inclusion of heterogeneous or diverse patient populations in a wide range…

Methodology · Statistics 2019-11-20 Eleanor J. Murray , Sonja A. Swanson , Miguel A. Hernán

Fairness is a desirable and crucial property of many protocols that handle, for instance, exchanges of message. It states that if at least one agent engaging in the protocol is honest, then either the protocol will unfold correctly and…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-11-01 Léonard Brice , Jean-François Raskin , Mathieu Sassolas , Guillaume Scerri , Marie van den Bogaard

Whereas deterministic protocols are typically guaranteed to obtain particular goals of interest, probabilistic protocols typically provide only probabilistic guarantees. This paper initiates an investigation of the interdependence between…

Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing · Computer Science 2020-07-08 Nitzan Zamir , Yoram Moses

Performing some task among a set of agents requires the use of some protocol that regulates the interactions between them. If those agents are rational, they may try to subvert the protocol for their own benefit, in an attempt to reach an…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2016-11-18 Josep Domingo-Ferrer , Jordi Soria-Comas , Oana Ciobotaru

We describe human-subject laboratory experiments on probabilistic auctions based on previously proposed auction protocols involving the simulated manipulation and communication of quantum states. These auctions are probabilistic in…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2009-03-31 Kay-Yut Chen , Tad Hogg

We consider the problem of incentivising desirable behaviours in multi-agent systems by way of taxation schemes. Our study employs the concurrent games model: in this model, each agent is primarily motivated to seek the satisfaction of a…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2023-07-12 David Hyland , Julian Gutierrez , Michael Wooldridge