The Enemy of My Enemy

Alessandro Stringhi, Sara Gil-Gallen and Andrea Albertazzi

No 349168, FEEM Working Papers from Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM)

Abstract: This paper studies how competition between groups affects cooperation. In the control condition, pairs of subjects play an indefinitely repeated Prisoner’s Dilemma game without external competition. In the treatment, two pairs compete against each other. No monetary rewards are tied to winning, isolating the bare impact of competition. In the treatment, cooperation increases by 16 percentage points. Strategies estimation shows a shift from selfish strategies (Always Defect) to cooperative ones (Grim Trigger). A theoretical model provides a rationale for the experimental results.

Keywords: Institutional; and; Behavioral; Economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27
Date: 2025-01-21
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp and nep-gth
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:feemwp:349168

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.349168

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