Game Theory and Applications

Dear Colleagues,

Game theory, which is the study of strategic decision making, was first developed as a branch of microeconomics. Since the seminal work of John Von Neumann, John Nash, and others, it has been recognised that there is an optimal strategy in the context of complex interactions (games) between two or more parties (players) that can lead to a predictable outcome (payoff). In practical situations, this outcome can often be quantitative and amenable to arithmetic operations (cost, number of infected people, number of vaccinated people, etc.), but it can be qualitative in nature (such as risk, readiness level, health state, etc.). A typical game defined in game theory has two or more players, a set of strategies available to these players, and a corresponding set of pay-off values (sometimes called utility values) for each player (which are, in the case of two-player games, often presented as a pay-off matrix). Game theory can be classified into two broad domains: non-cooperative game theory and cooperative game theory. Game Theory has become one of the conventional theoretical frameworks to model important decision-making processes in many aspects of life. In recent years, game theory has been adopted in diverse fields of study, such as evolutionary biology, sociology, psychology, political science and computer science. Game theory is used to study many phenomena and behavioural patterns in human societies and socio-economical systems, such as the emergence of and means of sustaining cooperation in communities and organisations, modelling of unethical or criminal behaviour, or the decision-making processes involved in vaccination against epidemics. Game Theory provides insight into peculiar behavioural interactions such as cooperative interactions within groups of animals, the bargaining and exchange in a marriage, or the incentivisation of Scottish salmon farmers. Game theory has gained such wide applicability due to the prevalence of strategic decision-making scenarios across different disciplines. The applications of game theory have become so diverse that it now spans many major disciplines. As such, it is eminently suitable to be defined as a ‘Topic’, which covers several MDPI journals. Therefore, we are proposing that ‘Game Theory and Applications’ is made a ‘Topic’ across the following four MDPI journals: [Algorithms, Games, Information, Mathematics]. As the topic editor, on behalf of my colleagues in the Topic board, I seek articles that could enrich this Topic collection. Papers can be one of the following types: [Articles, Reviews, etc.].

Dr. Mahendra Piraveenan
Dr. Samit Bhattacharrya
Topic Editors