Persuading Skeptics and Reaffirming Believers

Abstract

In a world where rational individuals may hold di↵erent prior beliefs, a sender can influence the behavior of a receiver by controlling the informativeness of a signal. We characterize the set of distributions of posterior beliefs that can be induced by a signal, and provide necessary and su cient conditions for a sender to benefit from information control. We examine a class of models with no value of information control under common priors, and show that a sender generically benefits from information control under heterogeneous priors. We extend our analysis to cases where the receiver's prior is unknown to the sender.JEL classification: D72, D83, M31.

When Competence Hurts: Revelation of Complex Information

“…The model also corresponds to the general class of Bayesian persuasion games, as described in the seminal paper by Kamenica and Gentzkow [2009]. As in Kamenica and Gentzkow [2009]; Rayo and Segal [2010]; and Alonso and Câmara [2014], the sender can benefit from non-full disclosure. The main difference between my approach and Bayesian persuasion models is that I have no commitment in the sender's strategy.…”