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Competitive decision making: Two and a half frames

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Abstract

We argue that the study of competitive decision making has been heavily influenced by the frames of reference that are adopted by researchers. The dominant economic frame and the emergent behavioral frame describe largely separate phenomena and have little overlap. Drawing from examples of learning in games and markets, we show how each of these frames falls short of capturing some interesting elements in competitive decisions. We then describe how a coevolutionary perspective may be emerging as an integrative paradigm for the study of competitive decisions.

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This paper was prepared for the conference, Understanding Competitive Decision Making. Comments by the participants of that conference and Paul Shoemaker are gratefully acknowledged, as are discussions with Colin Camerer, Eldar Shafir, and Sharoni Shafir.

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Johnson, E.J., Russo, J.E. Competitive decision making: Two and a half frames. Marketing Letters 5, 289–302 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00993907

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