Striped mouse

Striped mouse

Striped mouse (Rhabdomys pumilio) on the cover of the August edition of Behaviour

Striped mouse (Rhabdomys pumilio) on the cover of the August edition of Behaviour
My photo and the accompanying paper (see List of publications) were published in this issue.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Summary: Sigmund et al. (2010)

Players incur costs when imposing fines on exploiters in 'public goods games'. Even the threat of punishment can increase average pro-social contribution and promote collaborative efforts, yet emergence and stability of costly punishment are problematic. Sigmund et al. (2010) designed a model to compare peer-punishment with pool-punishment, which facilitates the sanctioning of second-order free-riders (those who do not punish exploiters), to determine the most beneficial reward system. The systems are expensive ways to encourage free-riders to cooperate. Spread of second-order free-riders can cause cooperation collapse. Without second-order punishment, the peer-punishment is optimal, but in the presence of second-order punishment, pool-punishers do better. Efficiency is traded for stability. Emergence and stability of costly punishing systems, which regulate common group resources and enforce collaborative efforts, do not require group selection or higher authority prescription. While Sigmund et al. (2010)'s model is minimialistic, it is sound in principle.

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