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Group-Level Selection Increases Cooperation in the Public Goods Game

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  • Catherine C Eckel
  • Enrique Fatas
  • Sara Godoy
  • Rick K Wilson

Abstract

When groups compete for resources, some groups will be more successful than others, forcing out less successful groups. Group-level selection is the most extreme form of group competition, where the weaker group ceases to exist, becoming extinct. We implement group-level selection in a controlled laboratory experiment in order to study its impact on human cooperation. The experiment uses variations on the standard linear public goods game. Group-level selection operates through competition for survival: the least successful, lowest-earning groups become extinct, in the sense that they no longer are able to play the game. Additional control treatments include group comparison without extinction, and extinction of the least successful individuals across groups. We find that group-level extinction produces very high contributions to the provision of the public good, while group comparison alone or individual extinction fail to cause higher contributions. Our results provide stark evidence that group-level selection enhances within-group cooperation.

Suggested Citation

  • Catherine C Eckel & Enrique Fatas & Sara Godoy & Rick K Wilson, 2016. "Group-Level Selection Increases Cooperation in the Public Goods Game," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(8), pages 1-13, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0157840
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0157840
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Kandul, Serhiy & Lanz, Bruno, 2021. "Public good provision, in-group cooperation and out-group descriptive norms: A lab experiment," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    2. Tremblay, Ethan & Hupper, Afton & Waring, Timothy, 2019. "Cooperatives exhibit greater cooperation than comparable businesses: experimental evidence," SocArXiv 6x9p3, Center for Open Science.
    3. Eckel, Catherine C. & Fatas, Enrique & Kass, Malcolm, 2022. "Sacrifice: An experiment on the political economy of extreme intergroup punishment," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 90(C).
    4. Wang, Jianwei & Xu, Wenshu & Chen, Wei & Yu, Fengyuan & He, Jialu, 2021. "Inter-group selection of strategy promotes cooperation in public goods game," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 583(C).
    5. Jiao, Yuhang & Chen, Tong & Chen, Qiao, 2020. "The impact of expressing willingness to cooperate on cooperation in public goods game," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    6. Hoenow, Nils Christian & Kirk, Michael, 2021. "Does competitive scarcity affect the speed of resource extraction? A common-pool resource lab-in-the-field experiment on land use in northern Namibia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).

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