Dear colleagues, The Department of Economics cordially invites you to the WU Economic Research Seminar (Department Seminar) on Wednesday, May 19th, with Lise Vesterlund (University of Pittsburgh) on "Belief Elicitation: Limiting Truth Telling with Information on Incentives" Abstract: We study truth telling within the current state-of-the-art mechanism for belief elicitation and examine how information on incentives affects reports on a known objective prior. We find that transparent information on incentives gives rise to error rates in excess of 40 percent, and that only 15 percent of participants consistently report the truth. False reports are conservative and appear to result from a biased perception of the BSR incentives. While attempts to debias are somewhat successful, the highest degree of truth telling occurs when information on quantitative incentives is withheld. Perversely the mechanism's incentives are shown to decrease truthful reporting. Date: Wednesday, May 19th Time: 4.30 to 6 pm (CET) Location: Zoom. You can access starting from 4.30 pm using this link<https://wu-ac-at.zoom.us/j/98861672525?pwd=SitYa2xaMi9FOGpoQ01IZlA2RGc0Zz09>. With best regards, Harald Oberhofer --- Univ.-Prof. Dr. Harald Oberhofer Institute for International Economics WU Vienna University of Economics and Business Phone: +43/1/31336-4984 Fax: +43/1/31336-4984 Email: harald.oberhofer@wu.ac.at<mailto:harald.oberhofer@wu.ac.at> Webpage: https://www.wu.ac.at/ie/mitarbeiter/harald-oberhofer/ Austrian Institute of Economic Research (WIFO) Phone: +43/1/7982601-468 Fax: +43/1/7989386 Email: harald.oberhofer@wifo.ac.at<mailto:harald.oberhofer@wifo.ac.at> Webpage: http://www.wifo.ac.at/harald_oberhofer