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Serena Sandri

Reflexivity in Economics An Experimental Examination on the Self-Referentiality of Economic Theories

Physica-Verlag A Springer Company

Reflexivity in Economics

Serena Sandri

Reflexivity in Economics An Experimental Examination on the Self-Referentiality of Economic Theories

Physica-Verlag A Springer Company

Dr. Serena Sandri Humboldt-Universita¨ t zu Berlin Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakulta¨ t Institut fu¨ r Entrepreneurship Spandauer Str. 1 10178 Berlin Germany [email protected]

ISBN: 978-3-7908-2091-1 e-ISBN: 978-3-7908-2092-8 DOI: 10.1007/978-3-7908-2092-8 Contributions to Economics ISSN: 1431-1933 Library of Congress Control Number: 2008935108 © 2009 Physica-Verlag Heidelberg This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilm or in any other way, and storage in data banks. Duplication of this publication or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the German Copyright Law of September 9, 1965, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer. Violations are liable to prosecution under the German Copyright Law. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. Cover design: WMXDesign GmbH, Heidelberg Printed on acid-free paper 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 springer.com

To Ali, my father-in-law

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank my supervisor, Prof. Marco Lehmann-Waffenschmidt, for his support and helpful comments. Further, I especially thank Prof. Werner G¨uth for his constructive suggestions and for his supervision of the experimental part of this work. For funding the experiments reported in this dissertation I gratefully acknowledge the Max Planck Institute for Economics in Jena and the University of Bari.

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Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1

1

Reflexivity and Self-Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 Definition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2 Reference Relations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2.1 Reflection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2.2 Universality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2.3 Ungroundedness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3 Varieties of Self-Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.4 Taxonomies of Self-References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .