Evolutionarily rational mutations in structured populations

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Tatur, Tymon
• 署名单位: University of Bonn
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC THEORY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-0531
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jet.2023.105677
• 发表日期: 2023
• 关键词: Evolutionary game theory; Mutation strategies; Endogenous mutations; evolutionary stability; Finite; populations; repeated games

摘要

This paper considers an evolutionary dynamic to study games played in large populations that consist of many identical, potentially small subpopulations, where individuals interact with others in their subpopulation, rarely moving between them. Since long-run behavior depends on the used mutation strategies, a criterion loosely inspired by Maynard Smith's (1972) notion of an evolutionary stable strategy is imposed on mutation strategies - we ask which mutation strategies are robust to invasions by others. Non-degenerate mutation strategies lead to behavioral diversity. Populations that use different interaction strategies in different subpopulations can be robust to invasions, even if each interaction strategy would not be robust if used by the entire population. Mutation strategies satisfying the proposed criterion always exist. A simple characterization is possible for the case of weak selection. The developed theory yields a rich class of predictions that can be inconsistent with standard concepts like Nash equilibrium. For instance, for finitely repeated games, the model always predicts relatively high payoffs if the stage game is repeated sufficiently often. & COPY; 2023 Published by Elsevier Inc.