Culture and cooperation
Top Cited Papers
- 12 September 2010
- journal article
- research article
- Published by The Royal Society in Philosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences
- Vol. 365 (1553) , 2651-2661
- https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2010.0135
Abstract
Does the cultural background influence the success with which genetically unrelated individuals cooperate in social dilemma situations? In this paper, we provide an answer by analysing the data of Herrmann et al. (2008a), who studied cooperation and punishment in 16 subject pools from six different world cultures (as classified by Inglehart & Baker (2000)). We use analysis of variance to disentangle the importance of cultural background relative to individual heterogeneity and group-level differences in cooperation. We find that culture has a substantial influence on the extent of cooperation, in addition to individual heterogeneity and group-level differences identified by previous research. The significance of this result is that cultural background has a substantial influence on cooperation in otherwise identical environments. This is particularly true in the presence of punishment opportunities.Keywords
All Related Versions
This publication has 91 references indexed in Scilit:
- Gene–culture coevolution and the nature of human socialityPhilosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 2011
- Micromotives, Microstructure, and Macrobehavior: The Case of Voluntary CooperationThe Journal of Mathematical Sociology, 2011
- Variation and the response to variation as a basis for successful cooperationPhilosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 2010
- Punishment and spite, the dark side of cooperationPhilosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 2010
- Evolutionary causes and consequences of consistent individual variation in cooperative behaviourPhilosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 2010
- Why Copy Others? Insights from the Social Learning Strategies TournamentScience, 2010
- Costly punishment does not always increase cooperationProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009
- Globalization and human cooperationProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009
- Reciprocity, culture and human cooperation: previous insights and a new cross-cultural experimentPhilosophical Transactions Of The Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 2008
- Five Rules for the Evolution of CooperationScience, 2006