COU 6: Expectations Mattering

Imagine two persons labeled “Person A” and “Person B”. Imagine that these persons are each deciding whether or not to participate in a protest. Each knows that there is “power in numbers”. Specifically, if both participate in the protest, each of them are unlikely to be harmed in the protest and the protest will achieve the political objective they share. But if either one participates while the other does not, the one who participates is likely to be arrested, beaten or killed and the sparsely attended protest will have the effect of undermining their shared political objective.

The following matrix form of a two-by-two game depicts the interaction between Person A and Person B:

Prompt 1

Describe how Person A’s preference ordering over her actions depends on her expectations about the action Person B will take.
Explain how you know the answer to (a) by stating Person A’s utility levels at the relevant profiles and explaining what those utility levels imply about Person A’s preference ordering over her actions for each expectation she could have.

Prompt 2

Describe how Person B’s preference ordering over her actions depends on her expectations about the action Person A will take.
Explain how you know the answer to (a) by stating Person B’s utility levels at the relevant profiles and explaining what those utility levels imply about Person B’s preference ordering over her actions for each expectation she could have.

Prompt 3

What is the maximum utility level Person B can achieve if Person A does not participate?
Explain how you know the answer to (a) by stating the utility levels Person B can achieve from each of her actions if Person A does not participate.

Prompt 4

What is the maximum utility level Person B can achieve if Person A participates?
Explain how you know the answer to (a) by stating the utility levels Person B can achieve from each of her actions if Person A participates.

Prompt 5

If you answered Prompts 3 and 4 correctly, then you know that the maximum utility level that Person B can achieve is higher if Person A participates than if Person A does not participate. Because of this, we can imagine that Person B might want to make it more likely that Person A will participate. In no more than half a page of double-spaced text, describe how Person A’s expectations about the action Person B will take influence her incentives to participate and explain how you know that Person A’s expectations influence Person A’s incentives in that way.

(Note: If you correctly answered Prompt 1, then you have a good basis for answering this question!)

Prompt 6

Organizers working to plan and lead protests against repressive regimes are often aware of the connection between expectations and incentives that this model depicts. More specifically, they are aware that persons are reluctant to participate in a protest when they expect few other persons will participate, and eager to participate in a protest when they expect a large number of persons to participate. Thus organizers are aware that expectations about the size of an upcoming protest can be self-fulfilling. I.e., if most persons expect that few person will participate, most person will be reluctant to participate and thus few persons will participate. And if most persons expect many persons will participate, most persons will be willing to participate and thus many persons will participate.

In no more than one page of double-spaced text, (a) describe a tactic that you imagine organizers might use to cause persons to expect that the number of persons who will participate in an upcoming protest will be large and (b) explain why you think the tactic would be effective in raising persons’ expectations about the number of persons who will participate in the protest.

The key thing you must do in this answer is focus on tactics that affect expectations about the number of persons who will participate in the upcoming protest, and why you think those tactics will affect those expectations. Do not write about a tactic that might affect the number of people who participate through mechanisms other than persons’ expectations about the number who will participate!

Rubric

Prompt 1

A successful answer to this prompt does all of the following

States that Person A prefers to participate instead of not participate if she expects Person B to participate.
Correctly explains why this is apparent by stating the relative sizes of the relevant numbers in the matrix form.
States that Person A prefers to not participate instead of participate if she expects Person B to not participate.
Correctly explains why this is apparent by stating the relative sizes of the relevant numbers in the matrix form.
Is sufficiently free of errors of spelling, grammar and usage as to be readily and easily comprehensible.
If hand written, is immediately and easily legible.

An answer gets…

Four points…: if it meets all of the above criteria.
Two points…: if it meets criteria (a), (c), (e) and (f) and meets either criterion (b) or (d) but not both.
One point…: if it meets criteria (a), (c), (e) and (f) and meets neither criterion (b) nor (d).
Zero points…: if it misses any of criteria (a), (c), (e) or (f).

Prompt 2

A successful answer to this prompt does all of the following

States that Person B prefers to participate instead of not participate if she expects Person A to participate.
Correctly explains why this is apparent by stating the relative sizes of the relevant numbers in the matrix form.
States that Person B prefers to not participate instead of participate if she expects Person A to not participate.
Correctly explains why this is apparent by stating the relative sizes of the relevant numbers in the matrix form.
Is sufficiently free of errors of spelling, grammar and usage as to be readily and easily comprehensible.
If hand written, is immediately and easily legible.

An answer gets…

Four points…: if it meets all of the above criteria.
Two points…: if it meets criteria (a), (c), (e) and (f) and meets either criterion (b) or (d) but not both.
One point…: if it meets criteria (a), (c), (e) and (f) and meets neither criterion (b) nor (d).
Zero points…: if it misses any of criteria (a), (c), (e) or (f).

Prompt 3

An answer gets one point for correct answering part (a). For part (b) it gets one points if it correctly states the utility levels Person B gets from each of her actions if Person A does not participate. No partial credit available.

Prompt 4

An answer gets one point for correct answering part (a). For part (b) it gets one point if it correctly states the utility levels Person B gets from each of her actions if Person A participates. No partial credit available.

Prompt 5

A successful answer to this prompt does all of the following

It states Person A’s preferences over her available actions when she expects Person B to participate.
It states Person A’s preferences over her available actions when she expects Person B to not participate.
It claims, in a way consistent with what it says in (a) and (b), that Person A is more inclined to participate when she has a certain expectation about the action that Person B will take than when she has a different expectation.
It is sufficiently free of errors of spelling, grammar and usage as to be readily and easily comprehensible.
If hand written, it is immediately and easily legible.

An answer gets…

Four points…: if it meets all of the above criteria.
Two points…: if it meets criteria (c), (d) and (e) and meets either criterion (a) or (b) but not both.
One point…: if it meets criteria (c), (d) and (e) and meets neither criterion (a) nor (b).
Zero points…: if it misses any of criteria (c), (d) or (e).

Prompt 6

A successful answer does all of the following:

Describes a tactic one could employ as a protest organizer and presents that tactic as affecting persons’ expectations about the number of other persons who will participate in the protest.
Explains how that tactic would cause persons to expect that the number of other persons who participate will be larger.
It must be sufficiently free of errors of spelling, grammar and usage as to be readily and easily comprehensible.
If hand written, it must be immediately and easily legible.

An answer gets…

Four points…: if it meets all of the above criteria.
Two points…: if it meets criteria (a), (d) and (e) but not (b).
Zero points…: if it misses any of criteria (a), (d) or (e).