Date of This Version
May 2008
Abstract
The survey is concerned with the issue of information transmission from experts to non-experts. Two main approaches to the use of experts can be traced. According to the game-theoretic approach expertise is a case of asymmetric information between the expert, who is the better informed agent, and the non-expert, who is either a decision-maker or an evaluator of the expert’s performance. According to the Bayesian decision-theoretic approach the expert is the agent who announces his probabilistic opinion, and the non-expert has to incorporate that opinion into his beliefs in a consistent way, despite his poor understanding of the expert’s substantive knowledge. The two approaches ground the relationships between experts and non-experts on such different premises that their results are very poorly connected.
Recommended Citation
Valsecchi, Irene, "Learning from Experts" (May 15, 2008). Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei Working Papers. Paper 194.
https://services.bepress.com/feem/paper194