Bayesian Elicitation

TL;DR

This paper explores how decision-makers can strategically limit their own observation capabilities to improve information gathering from agents, demonstrating that opacity design can match full commitment and enhance expected payoffs.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of opacity design in binary-action games, showing its effectiveness in equalizing commitment and improving information acquisition outcomes.

Findings

Opacity design matches full commitment in effectiveness.

Information acquisition always benefits the receiver with opacity.

Opacity can prevent learning from decreasing expected payoffs.

Abstract

We study how a decision-maker can acquire more information from an agent by reducing her own ability to observe what the agent transmits. In a large class of binary-action games, opacity design is just as good as full commitment to actions and also guarantees that ex ante information acquisition always benefits the receiver, even though without opacity design this learning might actually lower the receiver's expected payoff.