Conditional Cooperation and Betrayal Aversion

Robin Cubitt, Simon Gächter and Simone Quercia

No 9241, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We investigate whether there is a link between conditional cooperation and betrayal aversion. We use a public goods game to classify subjects by type of contribution preference and by belief about the contributions of others; and we measure betrayal aversion for different categories of subject. We find that, among conditional cooperators, only those who expect others to contribute little to the public good are significantly betrayal averse, while there is no evidence of betrayal aversion for those who expect substantial contributions by others. This is consistent with their social risk taking in public goods games, as the pessimistic conditional cooperators tend to avoid contribution to avoid exploitation, whereas the optimistic ones typically contribute to the public good and thus take the social risk of being exploited.

Keywords: exploitation aversion; betrayal aversion; trust; conditional cooperation; public goods game; free riding; experiments (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C72 C91 D03 H41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 36 pages
Date: 2015-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-cdm, nep-exp, nep-gth, nep-soc and nep-upt
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Published - revised version published in: Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2019, 111, 53 - 69

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Related works:
Journal Article: Conditional cooperation and betrayal aversion (2017)
Working Paper: Conditional Cooperation and Betrayal Aversion (2015)
Working Paper: Conditional Cooperation and Betrayal Aversion (2015)
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