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arXiv · 2407.01528

Random Attention and Unobserved Reference Alternatives

Varun Bansal
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Abstract

In this paper, I develop and characterize two models of random attention that differ from each other with respect to the menu-dependence of the unobserved reference alternatives. In both models, the decision-maker pays attention to subsets of the available set of alternatives randomly with the reference alternatives being always paid attention to. Under menu-dependence, partial identification of both the reference alternatives and the underlying preferences is provided. For the case of multiple menu-independent references, I provide a complete identification of the references and a coarse identification of the underlying preferences. A complete identification of the latter is provided when the independent random attention function is considered.

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Varun Bansal. 2024-07-01. Random Attention and Unobserved Reference Alternatives. https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.01528

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