"Belief Formation under Signal Correlation"

We characterize how people form beliefs about a random variable based on independent and correlated signals using laboratory experiments. Subjects form their beliefs in an unbiased, yet suboptimal, way. While they overestimate the value of moderately or strongly correlated signals, in a finding new to the literature, they underestimate the value of weakly correlated signals. These suggest that people do not completely neglect correlation in signals. Rather, they may under or over adjust for correlation based on the correlation structure. Additionally, people undervalue aggregated information about other people's private signals in favor of their own private signals.

DATE, DAY
21 February 2018, Wednesday

TIME
2:30p.m. – 4:00p.m

VENUE
ACI Seminar Room 1
Block S4-B5, Nanyang Avenue
Nanyang Technological University
Singapore 639798

About the Speaker:
Tanjim Hossain is an Associate Professor of Marketing and Economics at the Rotman School of Management and the Department of Economics of the University of Toronto. His main research interests include behavioural economics, applied microeconomics, and industrial organization, especially using field and laboratory experiments to test the validity of theoretical predictions in the real world. His research has been published in American Economic Review, Management Science, Marketing Science, Quarterly Journal of Economics, and Review of Economic Studies, and has been featured in The Economist, USA Today, and other news outlets. He serves as an associate editorial of Management Science and has received multiple awards for excellence in refereeing. He is the director of the Master of Management of Innovation and a chief scientist of Behavioural Economics in Action at Rotman.

For more information, please contact us:
Institute on Asian Consumer Insight
Nanyang Technological University, Nanyang Business School,
50 Nanyang Avenue, Blk S4, level B4, Singapore 639798
Tel: +65 6790 4966
Email: aci-institute@ntu.edu.sg

Tanjim Hossain
Associate Professor of Marketing and Economics
Rotman School of Management
Department of Economics
University of Toronto