Weak Reciprocity Research Articles

Leveraging the Honor Code: Public Goods Contributions under Oath

Public good games are at the core of many environmental challenges. In such social dilemmas, a large share of people endorse the norm of reciprocity. A growing literature complements this finding with the observation that many players exhibit a self-serving bias in reciprocation: “weak reciprocators” increase their contributions as a function of the effort level of the other players, but less than proportionally. In this paper, we build upon a growing literature on truth-telling to argue that weak reciprocity might be best conceived not as a preference, but rather as a symptom of an internal trade-off at the player level between (i) the truthful revelation of their private reciprocal preference, and (ii) the economic incentives they face (which foster free-riding). In truth-telling experiments, many players misrepresent private information when this is to their material benefit, but to a significantly lesser extent than what would be expected based on the profit-maximizing strategy. We apply this behavioral insight to strategic situations, and test whether the preference revelation properties of the classic voluntary contribution game can be improved by offering players the possibility to sign a classic truth-telling oath. Our results suggest that the honesty oath helps increase cooperation (by 33% in our experiment). Subjects under oath contribute in a way which is more consistent with (i) the contribution they expect from the other players and (ii) their normative views about the right contribution level. As a result, the distribution of social types elicited under oath differs from the one observed in the baseline: some free-riders, and many weak reciprocators, now behave as pure reciprocators.

Avoiding sexual interference: herkogamy and dichogamy in style dimorphic flowers of Narcissus broussonetii (Amaryllidaceae).

Spatial (herkogamy) or temporal (dichogamy) separation of sex organs are mechanisms considered to restrict self-pollination and promote outcrossing. Additionally, avoidance of self-interference is proposed to be the driving force for the evolution of these mechanisms, particularly in self-incompatible species. However, species with anthers and stigmas at different levels may increase the rate of imprecise pollen transfer, resulting in pollen discounting. Non-reciprocal stylar dimorphism has been considered a transitional, unstable stage towards the evolution of reciprocal style dimorphism (distyly), to simultaneously avoid interference and lack of precision. In this study we investigate the spatial and temporal separation of sex organs in a population of the style dimorphic and self-incompatible Narcissus broussonetii and their consequences in the reciprocity between the sex organs of morphs and their fecundity. First, we evaluated the relative growth of sex organs after anthesis. Then, we studied the stigma receptivity along the flower lifespan including its effect on seed production in both morphs. Finally, given the weak reciprocity between the sex organs of morphs of this species, we estimated population genetic diversity parameters in Long- and Short-styled plants to explore differences between them as a result of rates of inbreeding due to different mating strategies. We observed that Long-styled plants and Short-styled plants present different strategies to avoid sexual interference and both of them had negative consequences in the reciprocity between the sex organs of morphs. Long-styled plants exhibited a delay in stigma receptivity and a higher growth rate of the style after anthesis, while Short-styled plants presented higher herkogamy and no delay in stigma receptivity. These findings suggest that the avoidance of self-interference, in stylar dimorphic Narcissus species, seems to be more critical than improving of reciprocity between the sex organs of morphs. This might explain why reciprocal herkogamy (distyly) is rare in the genus.

In medio stat virtus: Theoretical and methodological extremes regarding reciprocity will not explain complex social behaviors

Guala contests the validity of strong reciprocity as a key element in shaping social behavior by contrasting evidence from experimental games to that of natural and historic data. He suggests that in order to understand the evolution of social behavior researchers should focus on natural data and weak reciprocity. We disagree with Guala's proposal to shift the focus of the study from one extreme of the spectrum (strong reciprocity) to the other extreme (weak reciprocity). We argue that the study of the evolution of social behavior must be comparative in nature, and we point out experimental evidence that shows that social behavior is not cooperation determined by a set of fixed factors. We argue for a model that sees social behavior as a dynamic interaction of genetic and environmental factors.

Weak reciprocity alone cannot explain peer punishment

The claims about (1) the lack of empirical support for a model of strong reciprocation and (2) the irrelevant empirical role of costly punishment to support cooperation in the field need qualifications. The interpretation of field evidence is not straightforward, and other-regarding preferences are also likely to play a role in the field.

Towards a unified theory of reciprocity

In a unified theory of human reciprocity, the strong and weak forms are similar because neither is biologically altruistic and both require normative motivation to support cooperation. However, strong reciprocity is necessary to support cooperation in public goods games. It involves inflicting costs on defectors; and though the costs for punishers are recouped, recouping costs requires complex institutions that would not have emerged if weak reciprocity had been enough.

Reciprocity: Weak or strong? What punishment experiments do (and do not) demonstrate

Economists and biologists have proposed a distinction between two mechanisms--"strong" and "weak" reciprocity--that may explain the evolution of human sociality. Weak reciprocity theorists emphasize the benefits of long-term cooperation and the use of low-cost strategies to deter free-riders. Strong reciprocity theorists, in contrast, claim that cooperation in social dilemma games can be sustained by costly punishment mechanisms, even in one-shot and finitely repeated games. To support this claim, they have generated a large body of evidence concerning the willingness of experimental subjects to punish uncooperative free-riders at a cost to themselves. In this article, I distinguish between a "narrow" and a "wide" reading of the experimental evidence. Under the narrow reading, punishment experiments are just useful devices to measure psychological propensities in controlled laboratory conditions. Under the wide reading, they replicate a mechanism that supports cooperation also in "real-world" situations outside the laboratory. I argue that the wide interpretation must be tested using a combination of laboratory data and evidence about cooperation "in the wild." In spite of some often-repeated claims, there is no evidence that cooperation in the small egalitarian societies studied by anthropologists is enforced by means of costly punishment. Moreover, studies by economic and social historians show that social dilemmas in the wild are typically solved by institutions that coordinate punishment, reduce its cost, and extend the horizon of cooperation. The lack of field evidence for costly punishment suggests important constraints about what forms of cooperation can or cannot be sustained by means of decentralised policing.

The restorative logic of punishment: Another argument in favor of weak selection

Strong reciprocity theorists claim that punishment has evolved to promote the good of the group and to deter cheating. By contrast, weak reciprocity suggests that punishment aims to restore justice (i.e., reciprocity) between the criminal and his victim. Experimental evidences as well as field observations suggest that humans punish criminals to restore fairness rather than to support group cooperation.

Integral and Variational Formulations for the Helmholtz Equation Inverse Source Problem

The purpose of this paper is to explore the Hilbert space functional structure of the Helmholtz equation inverse source problem. An integral equation for the sources reconstruction based on the composition of the trace and Green′s function operators is introduced and compared with the reciprocity source reconstruction methodologies. An equivalence theorem comparing the integral inverse source equation with the variational weak reciprocity gap functional equation is then demonstrated. Some examples on applications to the unitary disk are presented.

Understanding helping intention and its antecedents among instant messaging users

PurposeHelping intention is an important value that holds the key to the continuous user growth of instant messaging (IM). The purpose of this study is to validate a research model that examines online helping intention from a perspective of online social capital.Design/methodology/approachEmpirical testing of this model, through a survey of employees from seven large companies, confirms some theoretical expectations of this study. Two of the seven companies are from general service industries and the other five companies are from high‐tech industries. Of the 500 questionnaires distributed to participants, 364 usable questionnaires were returned for an effective response rate of 72.8 per cent.FindingsHelping intention is influenced by reciprocity, shared narratives, centrality, and network ties, whereas commitment and shared codes and language are not significantly related to helping intention.Research limitations/implicationsBased on the test results of this study, helping intention is affected by different social capital dimensions. In particular, low helping intention is attributed to a lack of online social capital, which can result from weak reciprocity, shared narratives, centrality, and network ties. This study has some limitations that relate to the measurement and interpretation of results. A major limitation is the possibility of a common method bias by using a single questionnaire to measure all constructs, which may inflate the strength of the relationships among these research constructs.Practical implicationsThis study recommends that those who support the establishment of helping culture among instant messaging users place emphasis on relational, cognitive, and structural capital. Both IM service developers and users should be aware that helping intention can be discouraged if any single dimension of social capital is ignored.Originality/valueThis paper fulfils an identified need to study how online helping intention can be strengthened.

Cooperation in and out of the lab: a comment on Binmore’s paper

The disagreement between Binmore and the “behaviouralists” concerns mainly the kind of reciprocity mechanisms that sustain cooperation in and out of the experimental laboratory. Although Binmore’s scepticism concerning Strong Reciprocity is justified, his case for Weak Reciprocity and the long-run convergence to Nash equilibria is unsupported by laboratory evidence. Part of the reason is that laboratory evidence alone cannot solve the reciprocity controversy, and researchers should pay more attention to field data. As an example, I briefly illustrate a historical case suggesting that the institutions that foster cooperation in the real world rely on Weak Reciprocity mechanisms such as those that feature prominently in Binmore’s story.

Adult and child understanding of simple reciprocal sentences

According to a standard view, the reciprocal pronoun has a fixed semantic value that defines a relation of weak reciprocity, and any stronger readings it may appear to have are pragmatic or lexical interactive effects (Fiengo & Lasnik 1973, Langendoen 1978). Dalrymple et al. 1995 counterproposes that the reciprocal pronoun has a flexible semantic value defining a range of readings of varying logical strength and that a semantic principle determines the reading required for a given reciprocal sentence on the basis of the meaning of its predicate. This article presents psycholinguistic evidence from adult speakers of English, Norwegian, and Dutch, and from child speakers of Dutch and Norwegian, which supports Dalrymple et al.'s analysis of the lexical content of the reciprocal pronoun but which also strongly suggests that the interpretive principle they posit is pragmatic rather than semantic in nature.

Reciprocity of Interpersonal Attraction: A Confirmed Hypothesis

An increase in reciprocity of interpersonal attraction during the early acquaintance period followed by continuing social reciprocity are common sense propositions that are central principles of several social psychological theories. However, there is little empirical evidence of increasing reciprocity of interpersonal attraction over time. There are two potential reasons for this failure to find reciprocity over time. First, the reciprocity correlation contains a mixture of two correlations: reciprocity at the individual level and reciprocity at the dyadic level. Second, physical proximity may affect reciprocity, particularly during early acquaintance. The two reciprocity correlations and effects of physical proximity can be estimated from a round robin design. Correlations computed by taking all possible dyads measured at five time points show weak reciprocity effects with a decrease across the five time points. The individual level correlations were small while the dyadic correlations were positive. Partialling out roommate effects from the dyadic correlation enhances increasing reciprocity over time. Thus, reciprocity of attraction does increase over time when one accounts for two different levels of analysis and controls for roommate effects.

On the Mathematical Theory of Social Processes Characterized by Weak Reciprocity

On the Mathematical Theory of Social Processes Characterized by Weak Reciprocity

Command fiber control of crayfish abdominal movement

1. The control of abdominal extension and flexion movements in the crayfishOrconectes rusticus, O. virilis andProcambarus clarkii was examined by monitoring the afferent and efferent unit activities in the dorsal nerve of the second abdominal segment during unrestrained abdominal extensions and flexions which were evoked by stimulation of command fibers (CFs) in the circumesophageal connective (CC). 2. CFs which when stimulated generate coordinated extensions and flexions are present in the CC ofP. clarkii. 3. Two classes of extension CFs are present in the CC ofP. clarkii: 1. those which excite the motor neuron (#4) which innervates the tonic receptor muscle (RM1) of the muscle receptor organ; 2. those which excite one or more of the excitatory motorneurons which do not innervate RM1 (#2, #3 and #6). 4. The extensor motorneurons are activated in reciprocal sets by CF stimulation. The inhibitory motor neuron (#5) is silent during CF evoked extensions (inP. clarkii.) 5. During flexion CF stimulation the inhibitory extensor motorneuron is excited while activity in the excitatory extensor motorneurons is suppressed. 6. The strong reciprocity observed in the superficial extensor motor neuron (SEMN) activities evoked by CF stimulation contrasts with the weak reciprocity which is characteristic of extensor motorneuron activities generated by the intact animal which moves its abdomen in response to a strong sensory stimulus (Sokolove, 1973). This difference in reciprocity supports the hypothesis that an intact animal initiates a postural movement of its abdomen by the conjoint excitation of several CFs. 7. Few if any extension CFs are present in the CC ofO. rusticus orO. virilis.