COOPERATION IN VISCOUS POPULATIONS - EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE

Friederike Mengel and Veronika Grimm ()

Working Papers. Serie AD from Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie)

Abstract: We experimentally investigate the effect of population viscosity (an increased probability to interact with others of one's type or group) on cooperation in a standard prisoner's dilemma environment. Subjects can repeatedly choose between two groups that differ in the defector gain in the associated prisoner's dilemma. Choosing into the group with the smaller defector-gain can signal one's willingness to cooperate. The degree of viscosity is varied across treatments. We find that viscosity produces an endogenous sorting of cooperators and defectors and persistently high rates ofcooperation. Higher viscosity leads to a sharp increase in overall cooperation rates and in addition positively affects the subjects' intrinsic willingness to cooperate.

Keywords: Experiments; Cooperation; Group Selection; Norms; Population (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C70 C73 C90 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 24 pages
Date: 2007-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-evo, nep-exp and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Published by Ivie

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http://www.ivie.es/downloads/docs/wpasad/wpasad-2007-17.pdf Fisrt version / Primera version, 2007 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Cooperation in viscous populations--Experimental evidence (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ivi:wpasad:2007-17

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