Abstract
Cooperation among genetically unrelated individuals can be supported by direct reciprocity. Theoretical models and experiments with adults show that the possibility of future interactions with the same partner can promote cooperation via conditionally cooperative strategies such as tit-for-tat (TFT). Here, we introduce a novel implementation of the repeated Prisoner’s Dilemma (PD) designed for children to examine whether repeated interactions can successfully promote cooperation in 10 and 11 year olds. We find that children cooperate substantially more in repeated PDs than in one-shot PDs. We also find that girls cooperate more than boys, and that children with more conduct problems cooperate less. Finally, we find that children use conditional cooperation strategies but that these strategies vary by gender and conduct problem rating. Specifically, girls and children with few conduct problems appear to follow an altruistic version of win-stay, lose-shift (WSLS), attempting to re-establish cooperation after they had defected. Boys and children with more conduct problems appear to follow a Grim strategy, defecting for the duration after the partner defects. Thus we provide evidence that children utilize the power of direct reciprocity to promote cooperation in strategic interactions and that, by late elementary school, distinct strategies of conditional cooperation have emerged.
Highlights
IntroductionExperimental comparisons of anonymous adults playing prisoner’s dilemma (PD) with different time horizons have shown that, for the same payoff matrix, people cooperate more in games with a higher potential for future interactions with the same partner[4,7]
Probability of future interaction)[5,6]
Regressions including trial number found that cooperation declined over the course of the session in both repeated and one-shot games, but that cooperation remained higher in the repeated games when controlling for trial number (Figure S1)
Summary
Experimental comparisons of anonymous adults playing PDs with different time horizons have shown that, for the same payoff matrix, people cooperate more in games with a higher potential for future interactions with the same partner[4,7]. (The few prior studies which have examined play in repeated PDs have not compared play to games of different lengths[25], and have either been non-anonymous[26,27] or involved more than 2 players[28]; in the latter case, cooperation is not expected to succeed even in the presence of repeated interactions). Comparing play in one-shot versus repeated PDs can reveal whether children recognize the potential for direct reciprocity in repeated games and whether they use strategies of conditional cooperation to encourage future cooperation. To explore the possibility that behavioral issues might influence children’s decisions, we asked parents to complete the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ)[33,34], a measure widely used to assess children’s behavioral problems on five dimensions: Prosocial Behavior, Conduct Problems, Emotional Problems, Hyperactivity and Peer Problems[35] (see Table S1 for full questionnaire)
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