What is Path-Dependent Learning

This chapter presents an artificial stock market created to analyze market dynamics from the behavior of investors. It argues that information—delivered by financial intermediaries as rating agencies and considered as cognitive institution—directs the decisions of investors who are heterogeneous agents endowed with capabilities of learning in a changing environment. The objective is to demonstrate that information influences market dynamics as it allows the coordination of the decisions of investment in the same direction: information is a focal point for investors and contributes to generate a speculative dynamic on the market.