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We study a decision-maker's problem of finding optimal monetary incentive schemes for retention when faced with agents whose participation decisions (stochastically) depend on the incentive they receive. Our focus is on policies constrained…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2024-07-31 Daniel Freund , Chamsi Hssaine

We introduce a novel extension of the canonical multi-armed bandit problem that incorporates an additional strategic innovation: abstention. In this enhanced framework, the agent is not only tasked with selecting an arm at each time step,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-03-24 Junwen Yang , Tianyuan Jin , Vincent Y. F. Tan

I study a principal-agent model in which a principal hires an agent to collect information about an unknown continuous state. The agent acquires a signal whose distribution is centered around the state, controlling the signal's precision at…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-05-05 Fan Wu

A contextual bandit problem is studied in a highly non-stationary environment, which is ubiquitous in various recommender systems due to the time-varying interests of users. Two models with disjoint and hybrid payoffs are considered to…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2020-03-03 Xiao Xu , Fang Dong , Yanghua Li , Shaojian He , Xin Li

Strategic learning studies how decision rules interact with agents who may strategically change their inputs/features to achieve better outcomes. In standard settings, models assume that the decision-maker's sole scope is to learn a…

Computer Science and Game Theory · Computer Science 2025-10-23 Valia Efthymiou , Ekaterina Fedorova , Chara Podimata

We investigate the management of information provision to maximize user engagement. A principal sequentially reveals signals to an agent who has a limited amount of information processing capacity and can choose to exit at any time. We…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-12-12 Benjamin Hébert , Weijie Zhong

We consider general Bayesian persuasion problems where the receiver's utility is single-peaked in a one-dimensional action. We show that a signal that pools at most two states in each realization is always optimal, and that such pairwise…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2023-11-07 Anton Kolotilin , Roberto Corrao , Alexander Wolitzky

The primary goal of reinforcement learning is to develop decision-making policies that prioritize optimal performance, frequently without considering safety. In contrast, safe reinforcement learning seeks to reduce or avoid unsafe behavior.…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-06-17 Zahra Shahrooei , Ali Baheri

Maximizing long-term rewards is the primary goal in sequential decision-making problems. The majority of existing methods assume that side information is freely available, enabling the learning agent to observe all features' states before…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-07-19 Saeed Ghoorchian , Evgenii Kortukov , Setareh Maghsudi

In this paper, we investigate a new multi-armed bandit (MAB) online learning model that considers real-world phenomena in many recommender systems: (i) the learning agent cannot pull the arms by itself and thus has to offer rewards to users…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2021-06-01 Tianchen Zhou , Jia Liu , Chaosheng Dong , Jingyuan Deng

We study a Bayesian persuasion problem with externalities. In this model, a principal sends signals to inform multiple agents about the state of the world. Simultaneously, due to the existence of externalities in the agents' utilities, the…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2024-12-18 Jonathan Shaki , Jiarui Gan , Sarit Kraus

We consider the well-studied dueling bandit problem, where a learner aims to identify near-optimal actions using pairwise comparisons, under the constraint of differential privacy. We consider a general class of utility-based preference…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-03-25 Aadirupa Saha , Hilal Asi

We show that in delegation problems, a principal benefits from belief misalignment vis-\`a-vis an agent when the latter can flexibly acquire costly information. The agent optimally succumbs to confirmatory learning, leading him to favor the…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2025-07-30 Pavel Ilinov , Andrei Matveenko , Maxim Senkov , Egor Starkov

Learning preferences implicit in the choices humans make is a well studied problem in both economics and computer science. However, most work makes the assumption that humans are acting (noisily) optimally with respect to their preferences.…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-01-28 Lawrence Chan , Dylan Hadfield-Menell , Siddhartha Srinivasa , Anca Dragan

We consider a bandit recommendations problem in which an agent's preferences (representing selection probabilities over recommended items) evolve as a function of past selections, according to an unknown $\textit{preference model}$. In each…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-02-07 Arpit Agarwal , William Brown

We present $\varepsilon$-retrain, an exploration strategy encouraging a behavioral preference while optimizing policies with monotonic improvement guarantees. To this end, we introduce an iterative procedure for collecting retrain areas --…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2025-04-15 Luca Marzari , Priya L. Donti , Changliu Liu , Enrico Marchesini

This paper proposes a method to design an optimal dynamic contract between a principal and an agent, who has the authority to control both the principal's revenue and an engineered system. The key characteristic of our problem setting is…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2014-03-24 Insoon Yang , Duncan S. Callaway , Claire J. Tomlin

We propose a new sequential decision-making setting, combining key aspects of two established online learning problems with bandit feedback. The optimal action to play at any given moment is contingent on an underlying changing state which…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-11-07 Alexander Galozy , Slawomir Nowaczyk , Mattias Ohlsson

Firms increasingly delegate decisions to learning algorithms in platform markets. Standard algorithms perform well when platform policies are stationary, but firms often face ambiguity about whether policies are stationary or adapt…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2026-02-11 Kyohei Okumura

We study the incentivized information acquisition problem, where a principal hires an agent to gather information on her behalf. Such a problem is modeled as a Stackelberg game between the principal and the agent, where the principal…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-08-08 Siyu Chen , Jibang Wu , Yifan Wu , Zhuoran Yang