Evolutionary Game Theory and Applications

University Of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI

Investigators

Abstract

This award funds research on four topics in evolutionary game theory and its applications. The first project uses evolutionary game dynamics to study residential segregation. Thomas Schelling has famously argued that a mild preference for not being in 'the minority' can result in highly segrated neighborhoods. Using new tools from evolutionary game theory, the investigator constructs and analyzes a new model of location choice dynamics. Using this model he investigates whether residential segregation is a stable outcome that arises from a wide variety of starting conditions. He also determines whether or not other preferences (for example, a preference for living near good schools) increase or decrease segregation in the model. The second project examines local stability of equilibrium under deterministic evolutionary dynamics in general population games. The third and fourth projects develop and analyze different models of stochastic evolution based on sequential arrival of revision opportunities and payoff noise. The PI also develops software to teach evolutionary dynamics to undergraduates and graduate students with little background in game theory.