Punishment and Cooperation

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan-Willem van Prooijen
Keyword(s):  
Social Groups ◽  
Crime Rates ◽  
Moral Norms ◽  
Economic Games ◽  
The Core ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Supernatural Punishment

One of the core assumptions of the proposition that moral punishment is an instinct is that punishment stimulates cooperation among group members. This chapter starts with supernatural punishment, illuminating that whereas belief in heaven has no effect on national crime rates, belief in hell reduces crime rates. Also, in economic games, the possibility to punish increases the cooperation that people display. These effects emerge because punishment increases deterrence, communicates moral norms, and instills trust. The chapter then notes that punishment has facilitated cooperation among strangers as people started forming large states, and that people become more punitive in situations that required unconditional cooperation and self-sacrifice for the group (i.e., war). These findings suggest that punishment indeed stimulates cooperation in social groups.

Copy the In-group: Group Membership Trumps Perceived Reliability, Warmth, and Competence in a Social-Learning Task

2021 ◽  
pp. 095679762110322
Author(s):  
Marcel Montrey ◽  
Thomas R. Shultz
Keyword(s):  
Social Learning ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Learning Strategy ◽  
Group Membership ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Learning Task ◽  
Minimal Group Paradigm ◽  
Learning Game ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Cumulative Cultural Evolution

Surprisingly little is known about how social groups influence social learning. Although several studies have shown that people prefer to copy in-group members, these studies have failed to resolve whether group membership genuinely affects who is copied or whether group membership merely correlates with other known factors, such as similarity and familiarity. Using the minimal-group paradigm, we disentangled these effects in an online social-learning game. In a sample of 540 adults, we found a robust in-group-copying bias that (a) was bolstered by a preference for observing in-group members; (b) overrode perceived reliability, warmth, and competence; (c) grew stronger when social information was scarce; and (d) even caused cultural divergence between intermixed groups. These results suggest that people genuinely employ a copy-the-in-group social-learning strategy, which could help explain how inefficient behaviors spread through social learning and how humans maintain the cultural diversity needed for cumulative cultural evolution.

Groups and Social Boundaries

2021 ◽  
pp. 72-108
Author(s):  
Jan Fuhse
Keyword(s):  
Social Relationships ◽  
Cultural Difference ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Boundaries ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Group Concept ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Network Patterns ◽  
Social Units

Social groups were a key concept in early sociology (German formal sociology, symbolic interactionism). Since the 1960s, they have been replaced by “social network” as the prime concept for informal social structures. We rarely find the bounded and internally homogeneous social units suggested by the group concept in the real world. Instead, individuals are embedded in a complex mesh of social relationships. Building on relational sociology, we can reconceptualize groups as a particular case of densely connected network patterns of social relationships. These exist only by degree, to the extent that they are reinforced by a social boundary separating the group members symbolically from the outside world and by foci of activity for the group to meet. Densely connected groups develop a particular group culture, and they frequently use symbols to signal group membership and the cultural difference to other groups and to the wider cultural context (group style).

Behavioural consistency and group conformity in humbug damselfish

Behaviour ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 154 (13-15) ◽  
pp. 1343-1359 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alicia L.J. Burns ◽  
Timothy M. Schaerf ◽  
Ashley J.W. Ward
Keyword(s):  
Dominance Rank ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Null Model ◽  
Group Level ◽  
Absolute Size ◽  
Social Hierarchies ◽  
Behavioural Type ◽  
Level Of Activity ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Dascyllus Aruanus

Abstract Humbug damselfish, Dascyllus aruanus, are a common coral reef fish that form stable social groups with size-based social hierarchies. Here we caught whole wild groups of damselfish and tested whether social groups tended to be comprised of animals that are more similar to one another in terms of their behavioural type, than expected by chance. First we found that individuals were repeatable in their level of activity and exploration, and that this was independent of both absolute size and within-group dominance rank, indicating that animals were behaviourally consistent. Secondly, despite the fact that individuals were tested independently, the behaviour of members of the same groups was significantly more similar than expected under a null model, suggesting that individual behaviour develops and is shaped by conformity to the behaviour of other group members. This is one of the first studies to demonstrate this group-level behavioural conformity in wild-caught groups.

When Punishment Backfires

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan-Willem van Prooijen
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary History ◽  
Cooperative Group ◽  
Economic Games ◽  
Cultural Conditions ◽  
Long Run ◽  
Group Members

Sometimes punishment can undermine cooperation. Antisocial punishment, where uncooperative group members punish cooperative group members, exists particularly in countries with lower levels of trust towards strangers. Furthermore, threatening with punishment in interpersonal encounters may undermine trust and cooperation, as people see the unwarranted threat of punishment as unfair. Finally, in economic games, punishment often increases cooperation but decreases the net payoff for individual participants. These insights are integrated with the idea that punishment is a moral instinct. This chapter notes that the cultural conditions that enable antisocial punishment emerged only recently in our evolutionary history, when people started living in large states and could be relatively self-sufficient. Furthermore, punishment not only increases but also stabilizes cooperation, increasing the net payoff for individuals in the long run.

scholarly journals Contrasts in kinship structure in mammalian societies

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 971-977 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Dyble ◽  
Tim H Clutton-Brock
Keyword(s):  
Social Groups ◽  
Theoretical Models ◽  
Competitive Behavior ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
Interspecific Differences ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Relative Rarity ◽  
Kinship Structure ◽  
Insight Into

Abstract Comparative studies of mammals confirm Hamilton’s prediction that differences in cooperative and competitive behavior across species will be related to contrasts in kinship between group members. Although theoretical models have explored the factors affecting kinship within social groups, few have analyzed the causes of contrasts in kinship among related species. Here, we describe interspecific differences in average kinship between group members among social mammals and show that a simple mathematical model that includes the number of breeding females, male reproductive skew, and litter size successfully predicts ~95% of observed variation in average kinship between group members across a sample of mammals. Our model shows that a wide range of conditions can generate groups with low average relatedness but only a small and rather specific set of conditions are likely to generate high average levels of relatedness between their members, providing insight into the relative rarity of advanced forms of cooperation in mammalian societies.

scholarly journals The influence of cooperation and competition on preschoolers' prosociality toward in-group and out-group members

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 202171
Author(s):  
Theo Toppe ◽  
Susanne Hardecker ◽  
Franca Zerres ◽  
Daniel B. M. Haun
Keyword(s):  
Social Dominance ◽  
Social Inclusion ◽  
Group Membership ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Dominance Orientation ◽  
Past Research ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Children’S Behaviour ◽  
Prosocial Behaviours ◽  
Group Member

Past research suggests that children favour their in-group members over out-group members as indicated by selective prosociality such as sharing or social inclusion. This preregistered study examined how playing a cooperative, competitive or solitary game influences German 4- to 6-year-olds’ in-group bias and their general willingness to act prosocially, independent of the recipient's group membership ( N = 144). After playing the game, experimenters introduced minimal groups and assessed children's sharing with an in-group and an out-group member as well as their social inclusion of an out-group member into an in-group interaction. Furthermore, we assessed children's physical engagement and parents' social dominance orientation (SDO)—a scale indicating the preference for inequality among social groups—to learn more about inter-individual differences in children's prosocial behaviours. Results suggest that children showed a stronger physical engagement while playing competitively as compared with cooperatively or alone. The different gaming contexts did not impact children's subsequent in-group bias or general willingness to act prosocially. Parental SDO was not linked to children's prosocial behaviours. These results indicate that competition can immediately affect children's behaviour while playing but raise doubt on the importance of cooperative and competitive play for children's subsequent intergroup and prosocial behaviour.

scholarly journals Socially foraging bats discriminate between group members based on search-phase echolocation calls

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (5) ◽  
pp. 1103-1112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenna E Kohles ◽  
Gerald G Carter ◽  
Rachel A Page ◽  
Dina K N Dechmann
Keyword(s):  
Individual Recognition ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Information ◽  
Individual Identity ◽  
Foraging Success ◽  
Playback Experiments ◽  
Echolocation Calls ◽  
Individual Discrimination ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Molossus Molossus

Abstract Animals have evolved diverse strategies to use social information for increasing foraging success and efficiency. Echolocating bats, for example, can eavesdrop on bats foraging nearby because they shift from search-phase calls to feeding buzzes when they detect prey. Feeding buzzes can directly convey information about prey presence, but it is unknown whether search-phase calls also convey social information. Here, we investigated whether search-phase echolocation calls, distinct calls produced by some bat species to scan large open areas for prey, can additionally convey individual identity. We tested this in Molossus molossus, a neotropical insectivorous bat that forages with group members, presumably to find ephemeral insect swarms more efficiently. We caught M. molossus from six different social groups and recorded their search-phase calls during a standardized release procedure, then recaptured and tested 19 marked bats with habituation–dishabituation playback experiments. We showed that they can discriminate between group members based on search-phase calls, and our statistical analysis of call parameters supported the presence of individual signatures in search-phase calls. Individual discrimination is a prerequisite of individual recognition, which may allow M. molossus to maintain contact with group members while foraging without using specialized signals for communication.

scholarly journals Genotype-by-genotype epistasis for exploratory behaviour in D. simulans

2020 ◽  
Vol 287 (1928) ◽  
pp. 20200057
Author(s):  
Allison Jaffe ◽  
Madeline P. Burns ◽  
Julia B. Saltz
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Genetic Architecture ◽  
Genetic Basis ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Exploratory Behaviour ◽  
Genotype Group ◽  
Quantitative Genetic ◽  
Social Plasticity ◽  
Group Members

Social interactions can influence the expression and underlying genetic basis of many traits. Yet, empirical investigations of indirect genetic effects (IGEs) and genotype-by-genotype epistasis—quantitative genetics parameters representing the role of genetic variation in a focal individual and its interacting partners in producing the observed trait values—are still scarce. While it is commonly observed that an individual's traits are influenced by the traits of interacting conspecifics, representing social plasticity, studying this social plasticity and its quantitative-genetic basis is notoriously challenging. These challenges are compounded when individuals interact in groups, rather than (simpler) dyads. Here, we investigate the genetic architecture of social plasticity for exploratory behaviour, one of the most intensively studied behaviours in recent decades. Using genotypes of Drosophila simulans , we measured genotypes both alone, and in social groups representing a mix of two genotypes. We found that females adjusted their exploratory behaviour based on the behaviour of others in the group, representing social plasticity. However, the direction of this plasticity depended on the identity of group members: focal individuals were more likely to emerge from a refuge if group members who were the same genotype as the focal remained inside for longer. By contrast, focal individuals were less likely to emerge from a refuge if partner-genotype group members remained inside for longer. Exploratory behaviour also depended on the identities of both genotypes that composed the group. Together, these findings demonstrate genotype-by-genotype epistasis for exploratory behaviour both within and among groups.

Well-Being

2019 ◽  
pp. 13-56
Author(s):  
Madison Powers
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Health Knowledge ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Moral Norms ◽  
The Core ◽  
Theories Of Justice ◽  
Core Elements ◽  
Equal Respect ◽  
Selection Of

This chapter defends a conception of well-being that underpins the theory of structural injustice. The core elements are health; knowledge and understanding; personal security; personal attachments; equal respect; and self-determination. The chapter points out the distinct ways that the conception of human well-being grounds human rights, explains the depth of unfairness of systematic patterns of disadvantage, and locates the fundamental unfairness of power relations in several forms of control some groups have over the most vital well-being interests of other groups. The conception is developed by way of a series of arguments that supports the selection of the core elements, and it offers a defense against a variety of objections to the inclusion of some elements on the list. The way in which the theory rests on a conception of well-being is distinguished from some other ways well-being informs other moral norms and other theories of justice.

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