Pathologies of iterated strict dominance revisited

Xuewen Qian; Chen Qu

doi:10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178

Pathologies of iterated strict dominance revisited

Research output: Journal Publication › Article › peer-review

Abstract

We revisit two pathologies of iterated elimination of strictly dominated strategies (IESDS) in infinite games: spurious Nash equilibria and order dependence. By introducing bounded dominance relations (Hsieh et al., 2023), we demonstrate that a bounded version of IESDS mitigates the former issue and is neutral to the latter. The second point is illustrated through a series of examples using ordinals. We also provide a sufficient and necessary condition for the non-existence of spurious Nash equilibria.

Original language	English
Article number	112178
Journal	Economics Letters
Volume	247
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178
Publication status	Published - Feb 2025

Free Keywords

Strict dominance
Iterated elimination
Nash equilibrium
Boundedness
Forgetfulness-proofness

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10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178

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title = "Pathologies of iterated strict dominance revisited",

abstract = "We revisit two pathologies of iterated elimination of strictly dominated strategies (IESDS) in infinite games: spurious Nash equilibria and order dependence. By introducing bounded dominance relations (Hsieh et al., 2023), we demonstrate that a bounded version of IESDS mitigates the former issue and is neutral to the latter. The second point is illustrated through a series of examples using ordinals. We also provide a sufficient and necessary condition for the non-existence of spurious Nash equilibria.",

keywords = "Strict dominance, Iterated elimination, Nash equilibrium, Boundedness, Forgetfulness-proofness",

author = "Xuewen Qian and Chen Qu",

year = "2025",

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doi = "10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178",

language = "English",

volume = "247",

journal = "Economics Letters",

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AU - Qian, Xuewen

AU - Qu, Chen

PY - 2025/2

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N2 - We revisit two pathologies of iterated elimination of strictly dominated strategies (IESDS) in infinite games: spurious Nash equilibria and order dependence. By introducing bounded dominance relations (Hsieh et al., 2023), we demonstrate that a bounded version of IESDS mitigates the former issue and is neutral to the latter. The second point is illustrated through a series of examples using ordinals. We also provide a sufficient and necessary condition for the non-existence of spurious Nash equilibria.

AB - We revisit two pathologies of iterated elimination of strictly dominated strategies (IESDS) in infinite games: spurious Nash equilibria and order dependence. By introducing bounded dominance relations (Hsieh et al., 2023), we demonstrate that a bounded version of IESDS mitigates the former issue and is neutral to the latter. The second point is illustrated through a series of examples using ordinals. We also provide a sufficient and necessary condition for the non-existence of spurious Nash equilibria.

KW - Strict dominance

KW - Iterated elimination

KW - Nash equilibrium

KW - Boundedness

KW - Forgetfulness-proofness

UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178

U2 - 10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178

DO - 10.1016/j.econlet.2025.112178

M3 - Article

SN - 0165-1765

VL - 247

JO - Economics Letters

JF - Economics Letters

M1 - 112178

ER -

Pathologies of iterated strict dominance revisited

Abstract

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