Tripartite evolutionary game analysis for “Deceive acquaintances” behavior of e-commerce platforms in cooperative supervision

Abstract

In the growing e-commerce market, “deceitful pricing for acquaintances” has increasingly attracted widespread attention from all walks of life. To protect the rights of consumers and maintain the sustainable development of e-commerce market, an evolutionary game model in accordance with PT-MA (Prospect Theory and Mental Account) is developed from the perspective of cooperative supervision between the government and consumers. Through theoretical derivation and simulation analysis, it is suggested that the evolution game of participants’ strategy does not have stable equilibrium point. Increasing the cost reference point and reducing the valance reference point can quickly reduce the probability of “deceitful pricing for acquaintances” and non-supervision. The greater the punishment will be, the e-commerce platforms are more likely to adopt the strategy of “non-deceitful pricing for acquaintances”. Increasing cooperative income and commission coefficient can encourage the government to adopt supervision strategies and make consumers participate in supervision. The results can guide the participants to make better decisions on e-commerce market.