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People prefer coordinated punishment in cooperative interactions

Author

Listed:
  • Lucas Molleman

    (Max Planck Institute for Human Development
    University of Nottingham
    University of Amsterdam)

  • Felix Kölle

    (University of Nottingham
    University of Cologne)

  • Chris Starmer

    (University of Nottingham)

  • Simon Gächter

    (University of Nottingham
    Center for Economic Studies
    IZA Institute of Labour Economics)

Abstract

Human groups can often maintain high levels of cooperation despite the threat of exploitation by individuals who reap the benefits of cooperation without contributing to its costs1–4. Prominent theoretical models suggest that cooperation is particularly likely to thrive if people join forces to curb free riding and punish their non-contributing peers in a coordinated fashion5. However, it is unclear whether and, if so, how people actually condition their punishment of peers on punishment behaviour by others. Here we provide direct evidence that many people prefer coordinated punishment. With two large-scale decision-making experiments (total n = 4,320), we create minimal and controlled conditions to examine preferences for conditional punishment and cleanly identify how the punishment decisions of individuals are impacted by the punishment behaviour by others. We find that the most frequent preference is to punish a peer only if another (third) individual does so as well. Coordinated punishment is particularly common among participants who shy away from initiating punishment. With an additional experiment we further show that preferences for conditional punishment are unrelated to well-studied preferences for conditional cooperation. Our results highlight the importance of conditional preferences in both positive and negative reciprocity, and they provide strong empirical support for theories that explain cooperation based on coordinated punishment.

Suggested Citation

  • Lucas Molleman & Felix Kölle & Chris Starmer & Simon Gächter, 2019. "People prefer coordinated punishment in cooperative interactions," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 3(11), pages 1145-1153, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nathum:v:3:y:2019:i:11:d:10.1038_s41562-019-0707-2
    DOI: 10.1038/s41562-019-0707-2
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    Cited by:

    1. Zvonimir Bašić & Parampreet C. Bindra & Daniela Glätzle-Rützler & Angelo Romano & Matthias Sutter & Claudia Zoller, 2021. "The Roots of Cooperation," ECONtribute Discussion Papers Series 097, University of Bonn and University of Cologne, Germany.
    2. Weber, Till O. & Schulz, Jonathan F. & Beranek, Benjamin & Lambarraa-Lehnhardt, Fatima & Gächter, Simon, 2023. "The behavioral mechanisms of voluntary cooperation across culturally diverse societies: Evidence from the US, the UK, Morocco, and Turkey," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 215(C), pages 134-152.
    3. Till O. Weber & Benjamin Beranek & Simon Gaechter & Fatima Lambarraa-Lehnhardt & Jonathan F. Schulz, 2021. "The Behavioural Mechanisms of Voluntary Cooperation in WEIRD and Non-WEIRD Societies," Discussion Papers 2021-03, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    4. Qian, Jun & Zhang, Tongda & Zhang, Yingfeng & Chai, Yueting & Sun, Xiao & Wang, Zhen, 2023. "The construction of peer punishment preference: how central power shapes prosocial and antisocial punishment behaviors," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 442(C).
    5. Marcus Giamattei & Kyanoush Seyed Yahosseini & Simon Gächter & Lucas Molleman, 2020. "LIONESS Lab: a free web-based platform for conducting interactive experiments online," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 6(1), pages 95-111, June.

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