Testability of evolutionary game dynamics models based on experimental economics data

TL;DR

This paper proposes a rigorous method to test the validity of evolutionary game dynamics models using experimental economics data, focusing on geometric patterns in game data.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach that quantifies the goodness-of-fit between experimental and theoretical patterns in game dynamics models.

Findings

The approach effectively evaluates model validity using angular momentum and speed patterns.

Experimental data from RPS games match theoretical patterns, validating the method.

The method provides a rigorous link between models and real game systems.

Abstract

Understanding the dynamic processes of a real game system requires an appropriate dynamics model, and rigorously testing a dynamics model is non-trivial. In our methodological research, we develop an approach to testing the validity of game dynamics models that considers the dynamic patterns of angular momentum and speed as measurement variables. Using Rock-Paper-Scissors (RPS) games as an example, we illustrate the geometric patterns in the experiment data. We then derive the related theoretical patterns from a series of typical dynamics models. By testing the goodness-of-fit between the experimental and theoretical patterns, we show that the validity of these models can be evaluated quantitatively. Our approach establishes a link between dynamics models and experimental systems, which is, to the best of our knowledge, the most effective and rigorous strategy for ascertaining the testability of evolutionary game dynamics models.