Diversity and Adaptation in Large Population Games

TL;DR

This paper studies how diversity among players in large population games affects system efficiency, showing that diversity improves efficiency and resource distribution despite slowing convergence.

Contribution

It introduces a model of large population games with adaptable strategies and demonstrates the positive impact of diversity on system efficiency and resource distribution.

Findings

Diversity improves system efficiency in large population games.

Diversity reduces resource inequality in steady state.

Diversity causes a mild transient resource spread.

Abstract

We consider a version of large population games whose players compete for resources using strategies with adaptable preferences. The system efficiency is measured by the variance of the decisions. In the regime where the system can be plagued by the maladaptive behavior of the players, we find that diversity among the players improves the system efficiency, though it slows the convergence to the steady state. Diversity causes a mild spread of resources at the transient state, but reduces the uneven distribution of resources in the steady state.