(Pro-)Social Learning and Strategic Disclosure

We study a sequential experimentation model with endogenous feedback. Agents choose between a safe and risky action, the latter generating stochastic rewards. When making this choice, each agent is selfishly motivated (myopic). However, agents can disclose their experiences to a public record, and when doing so are pro-socially motivated (forward-looking). When prior uncertainty is large, disclosure is both polarized (only extreme signals are disclosed) and positively biased (no feedback is bad news). When prior uncertainty is small, a novel form of unraveling occurs and disclosure is complete. Subsidizing disclosure costs can perversely lead to less disclosure but more experimentation.