Why be nice? Psychological constraints on the evolution of cooperation

Stevens, Jeffrey R.; Hauser, Marc D.

doi:10.1016/j.tics.2003.12.003

Cited by 508 publications

(395 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Although our clumped/accumulated design does model some natural cooperative situations, it does not reflect all instances of cooperation. These experiments suggest that cognitive constraints such as impulsivity may limit the role of reciprocity as a general mechanism of cooperation (Stevens and Hauser, 2004).…”

Section: Clumps and Cooperationmentioning

confidence: 87%

Effects of temporal clumping and payoff accumulation on impulsiveness and cooperation

Stephens¹,

McLinn²,

Stevens³

2006

Behavioural Processes

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Section: Clumps and Cooperationmentioning

confidence: 87%

Effects of temporal clumping and payoff accumulation on impulsiveness and cooperation

Stephens¹,

McLinn²,

Stevens³

2006

Behavioural Processes

Self Cite

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“…The evolution and maintenance of cooperative behaviour is likely constrained by the cognitive abilities in the species concerned (Stevens and Hauser 2004;Stevens et al 2005). This is particularly important in case individuals interact in reciprocal interactions, where the act of cooperating reduces the immediate payoVs for the actor and is hence an investment that often only yields beneWts in the future (Bergmüller et al 2007a, b;Bshary and Bergmüller 2008).…”

Section: Impulse Control and Cooperationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is particularly important in case individuals interact in reciprocal interactions, where the act of cooperating reduces the immediate payoVs for the actor and is hence an investment that often only yields beneWts in the future (Bergmüller et al 2007a, b;Bshary and Bergmüller 2008). Under these conditions, animals may require the capacity for individual recognition, low temporal discounting (Stevens and Hauser 2004), book keeping of past interactions with partners, and, as we suggest here, the ability to control impulsive behaviour in reverse reward choice situations. An important future research question in the Weld of cognition in the context of cooperation is therefore to investigate how the ability to control impulsive behaviour is linked to the ability of low temporal discounting, and how past experience with a partner (positive or negative) inXuences impulsive behaviour.…”

Section: Impulse Control and Cooperationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Impulse control may be advantageous in order to withhold an action that would have deleterious consequences in the future. Individuals may proWt from impulse control behaviour by avoiding unbeneWcial temporal discounting (Stevens and Hauser 2004;Abeyesinghe et al 2005;Stevens et al 2005;Wittmann and Paulus 2008) or when feeding against a preference (Genty and Roeder 2006;Wittmann and Paulus 2008). The ability to control impulsive behaviour should be particularly important in cooperative interactions, i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Do cleaner fish learn to feed against their preference in a reverse reward contingency task?

2009

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The ability to control impulsive behaviour has been studied in animals with a standard test in which subjects need to choose the smaller of two food items in order to receive the larger one (reverse reward contingency). As a variety of mammals that have been tested so far (mostly primates) have great diYculties to solve the task, it has been proposed that it is generally cognitively demanding. However, according to an ecological approach to cognition, a species' ability to solve the task should not depend on its general cognitive abilities but on whether its ecology causes selective pressure on the ability to restrain foraging behaviour. We tested this hypothesis using the cleaner wrasse (Labroides dimidiatus), a Wsh species that feeds against its preference in nature when engaging in cleaning interactions with so called 'client Wsh'. None of the eight tested individuals learned to choose a non-preferred item after 200 trials. In a subsequent test, one subject learned to respond correctly in a large or none contingency task (only the choice of the small food was rewarded). After a short re-experience treatment, this individual learned to solve the reverse reward task after 30 trials. In conclusion, we did not Wnd support for the general idea that interactions with clients prepared cleaners to quickly solve a reverse reward test. However, the results suggest that the potential to solve a reverse reward contingency may not be restricted to mammals but could be present also in a Wsh species in which the problem of choosing a non-preferred food over a preferred one is an ever present challenge in nature.

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“…A player keeps this gain even if the partner drops dead the minute after. In positive pseudoreciprocity, the observer has to look at the future behaviour of interactants to resolve the puzzle of investment, and temporal discounting (Stephens et al, 2002;Stevens and Hauser, 2004) may present a psychological barrier for this kind of cooperation in 'more cognitive' species. In negative pseudo-reciprocity, individuals cooperate to avoid negative consequences from selfserving behaviour of the partner, which is again very different from by-product mutualism.…”

Section: Alternative Classifications Schemesmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the further integration of cooperative breeding and cooperation theory

Bergmüller

Russell

Johnstone

et al. 2007

Behavioural Processes

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We present a synopsis about the commentaries to the target article "Integrating cooperative breeding into theoretical concepts of cooperation", in which we attempted to integrate general mechanisms to explain cooperative behaviour among unrelated individuals with classic concepts to explain helping behaviour in cooperative breeders that do not invoke kin-based benefits. Here we (1) summarize the positions of the commentators concerning the main issues we raised in the target article and discuss important criticisms and extensions. (2) We relate our target article to some recent reviews on the evolution of cooperation and, (3) clarify how we use terminology with regard to cooperation and cooperative behaviour. (4) We discuss several aspects that were raised with respect to cooperative interactions including by-product mutualism, generalised reciprocity and multi-level selection and, (5) examine the alternatives to our classification scheme as proposed by some commentaries. (6) Finally, we highlight several aspects that might hinder the application of game theoretical mechanisms of cooperation in cooperatively breeding systems. Although there is broad agreement that cooperative breeding theory should be integrated within the more general concepts of cooperation, there is some debate about how this may be achieved. We conclude that the contributions in this special issue provide a fruitful first step and ample suggestions for future directions with regard to a more unified framework of cooperation in cooperative breeders.

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Why be nice? Psychological constraints on the evolution of cooperation

Cited by 508 publications

References 39 publications

Effects of temporal clumping and payoff accumulation on impulsiveness and cooperation

Effects of temporal clumping and payoff accumulation on impulsiveness and cooperation

Do cleaner fish learn to feed against their preference in a reverse reward contingency task?

On the further integration of cooperative breeding and cooperation theory

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