No imitation: on local and group interaction, learning and reciprocity in prisoners' dilemma experiments

Oliver Kirchkamp and Rosemarie Nagel

No 03-04, Papers from Sonderforschungsbreich 504

Abstract: This study disentangles experimentally imitation, reinforcement, and reciprocity in repeated prisoners' dilemmas. We compare a simple situation in which players interact only with their neighbours (local interaction) with one where players interact with all members of the population (group interaction). We observe choices under different information conditions and estimate parameters of a learning model. We find that imitation, while assumed to be a driving force in many models of spatial evolution, is often a negligible factor in the experiment. Behaviour is predominantly driven by reinforcement learning.

Keywords: Local interaction; experiments; prisoner's dilemma; learning; reinforcement; repeated games (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C72 C92 D74 D83 H41 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mnh:spaper:2777

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