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Cooperation in PD Games: Fear, Greed, and History of Play

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Abstract

The impact of the cardinal relationships amongpecuniary payoffs, and of social history and reputation, on thechoice of strategies in four one-shot Prisoner's Dilemma games isexperimentally examined. The results suggest that normalized payoffvalues linked to ``fear'' and ``greed'' are important as predictorsof behavior in the PD games. Success in coordinating on the payoffdominant equilibrium in previous plays of coordination games alsoincreases the probability of cooperative play in the PD games. Theeffect of past play is strongest when individuals are matchedrepeatedly with the same person in previous play, as contrasted tobeing matched randomly with another player.

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Ahn, T., Ostrom, E., Schmidt, D. et al. Cooperation in PD Games: Fear, Greed, and History of Play. Public Choice 106, 137–155 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1005219123532

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