The Paradox of Misaligned Profiling: Theory and Experimental Evidence

This article implements an experimental test of a game-theoretic model of equilibrium profiling. Attackers choose a demographic "type" from which to recruit, and defenders choose which demographic types to search. Some types are more reliable than others in the sense of having a higher pro...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of conflict resolution 2016-04, Vol.60 (3), p.482-500
Main Authors: Holt, Charles A., Kydd, Andrew, Razzolini, Laura, Sheremeta, Roman
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Conflict resolution
Decision theory
Demographics
Demography
Economic theory
Equilibrium
Experiments
Game theory
Games
Nash equilibrium
P values
Predictions
Probability
Qualitative research
Racial profiling
Search and seizure
Studies
Terrorism
Terrorists
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This article implements an experimental test of a game-theoretic model of equilibrium profiling. Attackers choose a demographic "type" from which to recruit, and defenders choose which demographic types to search. Some types are more reliable than others in the sense of having a higher probability of carrying out a successful attack if they get past the security checkpoint. In a Nash equilibrium, defenders tend to profile by searching the more reliable attacker types more frequently, whereas the attackers tend to send less reliable types. Data from laboratory experiments with financially motivated human subjects are consistent with the qualitative patterns predicted by theory. However, we also find several interesting behavioral deviations from the theory.
ISSN:0022-0027
1552-8766
DOI:10.1177/0022002714545223