Guessing with negative feedback: an experiment.

We investigate experimentally a new variant of the beauty contest game (BCG) in which players’ actions are strategic substitutes (a negative feedback BCG). Our results show that chosen numbers are closer to the rational expectation equilibrium than in a strategic complements environment (a positive feedback BCG). We also find that the estimated average depth of reasoning from the cognitive hierarchy model does not differ between the two environments. We show that the difference may be attributed to the fact that additional information is more valuable when players’ actions are strategic substitutes rather than strategic complements, in line with other recent experimental findings.