Pre-enrollment and Game Theory
Consider the following payoff matrix:
The game is between you and everyone else. Like a typical game, every pair of strategies has a payoff both to you and your opponents. We assign 1 as payoffs to both sides in the event that everyone wakes up, and use them as a base for the other payoffs. First, if you do not wake up while others do, you will receive a payoff less than 1. The reason is when you pre-enroll at a later time, many of the popular classes are likely already full with people who have the same preferences as you. Your payoff is not 0, because you benefit from the extra sleep and lack of stress in the morning. The payoff for everyone else is still 1, since your absence does not effectively reduce the network traffic.
Conversely, if you are the only person who wakes up, then everyone else benefit from more sleep. On a much brighter note, you benefit from lack of traffic, and a faster rate of signing up for classes. The payoff for you is 10, because your diligence pays off, enabling you to take the classes you want.
Finally, consider the case where no one wakes up. Since no one signs up for classes, everyone benefits from sleep as well as ability to sign up for classes at a more convenient time. The payoffs for both sides then should be higher than 1 but smaller than 10, because network traffic will be persistent throughout the day. We assign them values of 5.
What is the strategy for both sides? Suppose everyone else wakes up. You receive a payoff of 1 if you wake up as well, and 0.5 if you do not. Then suppose no one else wakes up. You receive 10 for waking up, and 5 otherwise. Therefore, given the payoff matrix, you have a dominant strategy of waking up every time. Knowing that you will wake up, the best response for everyone else is to wake up as well. The pair of strategy ultimately leads to the large number of students climbing out of their warm beds at unearthly hours, followed by persistent network traffic that crashes Student Center every semester.
Unknowingly, we are all entered in this game of pre-enrollment, where ideas from game theory describes quite accurately what happens in real life. Despite potential reluctance, everyone subconsciously follows the rules laid out by those concepts, and act in best response to the situation. Conclusion? Can’t wait to be one of those lucky Seniors.