Abstract
Interdependent situations are pervasive in human life. In these situations, it is essential to form expectations about the others’ behaviour to adapt one's own behaviour to increase mutual outcomes and avoid exploitation. Social value orientation, which describes the dispositional weights individuals attach to their own and to another person's outcome, predicts these expectations of cooperation in social dilemmas—an interdependent situation involving a conflict of interests. Yet, scientific evidence is inconclusive about the exact differences in expectations between prosocials, individualists, and competitors. The present meta–analytic results show that, relative to proselfs (individualists and competitors), prosocials expect more cooperation from others in social dilemmas, whereas individualists and competitors do not significantly differ in their expectations. The importance of these expectations in the decision process is further highlighted by the finding that they partially mediate the well–established relation between social value orientation and cooperative behaviour in social dilemmas. In fact, even proselfs are more likely to cooperate when they expect their partner to cooperate. Copyright © 2018 European Association of Personality Psychology
Highlights
Human cooperation is a topic that cuts across several scientific disciplines
We examine the more general assertion that social value orientation (SVO) should predict expectations of others’ cooperation in social dilemmas and that these expectations can mediate the relation between SVO and cooperation
If SVO was mentioned in the abstract, we searched the entire article for the inclusion of SVO, expectations of others’ cooperation, and cooperation in a social dilemma
Summary
Human cooperation is a topic that cuts across several scientific disciplines. The general goal is to understand the mechanisms supporting cooperation. Many social dilemmas involve decision makers with little to no information about the motives and likely actions of others—for example, in group projects with new colleagues. In these situations, the decision maker’s dispositional concern for others’ welfare [or social value orientation (SVO); prosocial, individualistic, and competitive orientation; Van Lange, Otten, De Bruin, & Joireman, 1997] and expectations about others’ choices affect cooperation. The decision maker’s dispositional concern for others’ welfare [or social value orientation (SVO); prosocial, individualistic, and competitive orientation; Van Lange, Otten, De Bruin, & Joireman, 1997] and expectations about others’ choices affect cooperation The payoffs in all social dilemmas follow the same basic structure: T > R > P > S, and all social dilemmas contain a clear structural incentive to defect
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