A Value-Based Framework for Understanding Cooperation

Abstract

Understanding the roots of human cooperation, a social phenomenon embedded in pressing issues including climate change and social conflict, requires an interdisciplinary perspective. We propose a unifying value-based framework for understanding cooperation that integrates neuroeconomic models of decision-making with psychological variables involved in cooperation. We propose that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex serves as a neural integration hub for value computation during cooperative decisions, receiving inputs from various neurocognitive processes such as attention, memory, and learning. Next, we describe findings from social and personality psychology highlighting factors that shape the value of cooperation, including research on contexts and norms, personal and social identity, and intergroup relations. Our approach advances theoretical debates about cooperation by highlighting how previous findings are accommodated within a general value-based framework and offers novel predictions.

A feature-based network analysis and fMRI meta-analysis reveal three distinct types of prosocial decisions

“…Although some hypothesize the right TPJ-another core region of the mentalizing system-to be recruited during prosocial decision-making (Chakroff & Young, 2014;Parnamets et al, 2020), we did not find differential activation in this region across prosocial relative to selfish decisions.…”

“…And, while largely conserved across species (Burkart et al, 2014;de Waal, 2008;Hare, 2017), the prevalence and variety of prosociality exhibited by humans is unique (Fehr & Schurtenberger, 2018;Zaki & Mitchell, 2013). Although cognitive and neural processes underlying various forms of prosociality have been studied extensively across disciplines spanning psychology, neuroscience, economics, and biology, the heterogeneity of prosocial decisions has led to inconsistencies in how they are operationalized and categorized (Batson & Powell, 2003;de Waal, 2008;Declerck et al, 2013;Fehr et al, 2002;Fehr & Schmidt, 1999;Marsh, 2016;Parnamets et al, 2020;Rand & Nowak, 2013;Rilling et al, 2002;Ruff & Fehr, 2014;Tricomi & Sullivan-Toole, 2015). This can create challenges when interpreting findings across neuroimaging studies or when attempting to understand how different types of prosocial decisions vary in terms of their underlying processes.…”

“…In such tasks, agents also take on the role of beneficiaries (Chaudhuri, 2011;Rand & Nowak, 2013), and thus must arbitrate between their own and others' rewards. These tasks often recruit neural systems that support subjective valuation and reward expectancy, such as the ventromedial PFC and ventral striatum (Parnamets et al, 2020;Wills, Hackel, FeldmanHall, et al, 2018). These tasks also carry an element of uncertainty (Bellucci et al, 2017), with the agent's outcome often dependent on a beneficiary or trustee's choices (Mayer et al, 1995).…”

Inter-brain synchrony in teams predicts collective performance

“…Understanding collective performance requires moving beyond dyads to groups, where social identities and group processes (e.g., process loss, groupthink) are relevant. Identification with one's group may activate different norms (Bicchieri, 2002) and may therefore influence group cooperation (Brewer & Kramer, 1986;De Cremer & Van Vugt, 1999;Pärnamets et al, 2020).…”

Science as collaborative knowledge generation

“…Frustrating cross-disciplinary collaboration Collaborating with scholars who represent different research traditions, and working together in multidisciplinary teams and consortia, is only possible when people can see the value of using multiple methods, measures, and samples to investigate issues that are of theoretical and practical importance (e.g. P€ arnamets, Shuster, Reinero, & Van Bavel, 2020). In a competitive system, it is more difficult to adopt such a view and to use scholarly disagreement in a productive way.…”