IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/apmaco/v500y2025ics0096300325001638.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The role of environmental feedback in promoting cooperation among unequal groups

Author

Listed:
  • Yu, Xiaotong
  • Liang, Haili
  • Ren, Xiaoqiang
  • Rong, Zhihai
  • Wang, Xiaofan
  • Cao, Ming

Abstract

Cooperation plays a crucial role in addressing social dilemmas, yet inequality complicates the achievement of cooperation. This paper explores how environmental feedback mechanisms influence the evolution of cooperation within unequal groups. We construct a public goods game model that includes productivity and endowment inequalities and introduce a dynamic environmental feedback mechanism to study individual strategy choices in different environmental states. The results indicate that appropriate environmental feedback significantly improves cooperation levels. When there is only productivity inequality, appropriate environmental feedback increases the tendency of all individuals to cooperate, especially those with low productivity. In both productivity and endowment inequality, participants maintain a high level of cooperation when the initial endowment distribution falls within a certain range. Once the initial distribution of endowments exceeds this range, cooperative behavior quickly deteriorates. Our study provides a promising approach to enhancing the propensity for cooperation in unequal populations and highlights the significant role of adequate environmental feedback in promoting cooperation.

Suggested Citation

  • Yu, Xiaotong & Liang, Haili & Ren, Xiaoqiang & Rong, Zhihai & Wang, Xiaofan & Cao, Ming, 2025. "The role of environmental feedback in promoting cooperation among unequal groups," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 500(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:apmaco:v:500:y:2025:i:c:s0096300325001638
    DOI: 10.1016/j.amc.2025.129436
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0096300325001638
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.amc.2025.129436?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hargreaves Heap, Shaun P. & Ramalingam, Abhijit & Stoddard, Brock V., 2016. "Endowment inequality in public goods games: A re-examination," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 4-7.
    2. Cherry, Todd L. & Kroll, Stephan & Shogren, Jason F., 2005. "The impact of endowment heterogeneity and origin on public good contributions: evidence from the lab," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 57(3), pages 357-365, July.
    3. Maria Kleshnina & Christian Hilbe & Štěpán Šimsa & Krishnendu Chatterjee & Martin A. Nowak, 2023. "The effect of environmental information on evolution of cooperation in stochastic games," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    4. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez, 2014. "Inequality in the long run," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) halshs-01053609, HAL.
    5. Christian Hilbe & Štěpán Šimsa & Krishnendu Chatterjee & Martin A. Nowak, 2018. "Evolution of cooperation in stochastic games," Nature, Nature, vol. 559(7713), pages 246-249, July.
    6. Hauser, Oliver P. & Kraft-Todd, Gordon T. & Rand, David G. & Nowak, Martin A. & Norton, Michael I., 2021. "Invisible inequality leads to punishing the poor and rewarding the rich," Behavioural Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 5(3), pages 333-353, July.
    7. Oliver P. Hauser & Christian Hilbe & Krishnendu Chatterjee & Martin A. Nowak, 2019. "Social dilemmas among unequals," Nature, Nature, vol. 572(7770), pages 524-527, August.
    8. Claire Ecotière & Sylvain Billiard & Jean-Baptiste André & Pierre Collet & Régis Ferrière & Sylvie Méléard, 2023. "Human-environment feedback and the consistency of proenvironmental behavior," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 19(9), pages 1-22, September.
    9. Flávio L Pinheiro & Vítor V Vasconcelos & Francisco C Santos & Jorge M Pacheco, 2014. "Evolution of All-or-None Strategies in Repeated Public Goods Dilemmas," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(11), pages 1-5, November.
    10. Andrew R. Tilman & Joshua B. Plotkin & Erol Akçay, 2020. "Evolutionary games with environmental feedbacks," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 11(1), pages 1-11, December.
    11. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01053609 is not listed on IDEAS
    12. Xiaochen Wang & Lei Zhou & Alex McAvoy & Aming Li, 2023. "Imitation dynamics on networks with incomplete information," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    13. Maria Kleshnina & Christian Hilbe & Stepan Simsa & Krishnendu Chatterjee & Martin A. Nowak, 2023. "The effect of environmental information on evolution of cooperation in stochastic games," Post-Print hal-04210205, HAL.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Michael Foley & Rory Smead & Patrick Forber & Christoph Riedl, 2021. "Avoiding the bullies: The resilience of cooperation among unequals," PLOS Computational Biology, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(4), pages 1-19, April.
    2. Jinzhuo Liu & Mao Peng & Yunchen Peng & Yong Li & Chen Chu & Xiaoyu Li & Qing Liu, 2021. "Effects of inequality on a spatial evolutionary public goods game," The European Physical Journal B: Condensed Matter and Complex Systems, Springer;EDP Sciences, vol. 94(8), pages 1-7, August.
    3. Wang, Xiaoyue & He, Zhixue & Chen, Ju & Zhang, Mingjuan & Shi, Lei, 2025. "Balancing peer preference and payoff pursuit in migration shapes social cohesion within unequal endowment populations," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    4. Yilong Xu & Ginevra Marandola, 2023. "The (negative) effects of inequality on Social Capital," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(5), pages 1562-1588, December.
    5. Maria Kleshnina & Christian Hilbe & Štěpán Šimsa & Krishnendu Chatterjee & Martin A. Nowak, 2023. "The effect of environmental information on evolution of cooperation in stochastic games," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    6. Rémi Suchon & Vincent Théroude, 2025. "Cooperation across the inequality divide: the effect of the magnitude of inequality," Working Papers of BETA 2025-15, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    7. Yu, Fengyuan & Wang, Jianwei & He, Jialu, 2022. "Inequal dependence on members stabilizes cooperation in spatial public goods game," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 165(P1).
    8. Ma, Xiaojian & Quan, Ji & Wang, Xianjia, 2023. "Evolution of cooperation with nonlinear environment feedback in repeated public goods game," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 452(C).
    9. Campos-Vazquez, Raymundo M. & Krozer, Alice & Ramírez-Álvarez, Aurora A., 2023. "Preferred tax rates depend on the rates paid by the rich," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    10. Koessler, Ann-Kathrin & Müller, Julia & Zitzelsberger, Sonja, 2023. "Asymmetric heterogeneities and the role of transfers in a public goods experiment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    11. Derbyshire, Daniel W. & Drouvelis, Michalis & Grosskopf, Brit, 2025. "The poor, the rich and the middle class: Experimental evidence from heterogeneous public good games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    12. Xinmiao An & Yali Dong & Xiaomin Wang & Boyu Zhang, 2023. "Cooperation and Coordination in Threshold Public Goods Games with Asymmetric Players," Games, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-13, December.
    13. Kasper Otten & Ulrich J. Frey & Vincent Buskens & Wojtek Przepiorka & Naomi Ellemers, 2022. "Human cooperation in changing groups in a large-scale public goods game," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-11, December.
    14. Lu, Shounan & Wang, Yang, 2025. "Experience-driven learning and interactive rules under link weight adjustment promote cooperation in spatial prisoner's dilemma game," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 497(C).
    15. Charlotte S. L. Rossetti & Oliver P. Hauser & Christian Hilbe, 2025. "Dynamics of cooperation in concurrent games," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 16(1), pages 1-11, December.
    16. Zhao, Jinhua & Wang, Xianjia & Niu, Lei & Ding, Rui & Gu, Cuiling, 2023. "Cooperation in collective risk dilemmas with endogenous heterogeneity: Nash equilibrium and evolutionary dynamics," Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Elsevier, vol. 175(P1).
    17. Boyu Zhang & Yali Dong & Cheng-Zhong Qin & Sergey Gavrilets, 2023. "Kinship can hinder cooperation in heterogeneous populations," Papers 2305.19026, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2023.
    18. De Geest, Lawrence R. & Kingsley, David C., 2021. "Norm enforcement with incomplete information," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 189(C), pages 403-430.
    19. Falvey, Rod & Lane, Tom & Luckraz, Shravan, 2025. "On a mechanism that improves efficiency and reduces inequality in voluntary contribution games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 518-536.
    20. Paton Pak Chun Yam & Gary Ting Tat Ng & Wing Tung Au & Lin Tao & Su Lu & Hildie Leung & Jane M Y Fung, 2018. "The effect of subgroup homogeneity of efficacy on contribution in public good dilemmas," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(7), pages 1-18, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:apmaco:v:500:y:2025:i:c:s0096300325001638. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/applied-mathematics-and-computation .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.