Non-Standard Choice in Matching Markets

TL;DR

This paper investigates how matching mechanisms can be designed to handle non-standard choice behaviors, establishing conditions for stability and incentive compatibility, and demonstrating practical modifications to existing mechanisms.

Contribution

It provides necessary and sufficient conditions for stable, incentive-compatible matching mechanisms accommodating non-standard choices, and shows practical modifications to existing mechanisms.

Findings

Matching mechanisms can be adapted for non-standard choice behaviors.

Conditions for stability and incentive compatibility are characterized.

A simple modification enables common mechanisms to handle non-standard choices.

Abstract

We explore the possibility of designing matching mechanisms that can accommodate non-standard choice behavior. We pin down the necessary and sufficient conditions on participants' choice behavior for the existence of stable and incentive compatible mechanisms. Our results imply that well-functioning matching markets can be designed to adequately accommodate a plethora of choice behaviors, including the standard behavior consistent with preference maximization. To illustrate the significance of our results in practice, we show that a simple modification in a commonly used matching mechanism enables it to accommodate non-standard choice behavior.