Coevolution between positive reciprocity, punishment, and partner switching in repeated interactions

Abstract

Cooperation based on mutual investments can occur between unrelated individuals when they are engaged in repeated interactions. Individuals then need to use a conditional strategy to deter their interaction partners from defecting. Responding to defection such that the future payoff of a defector is reduced relative to cooperating with it is called a partner control mechanism. Three main partner control mechanisms are (i) to switch from cooperation to defection when being defected ('positive reciprocity'), (ii) to actively reduce the payoff of a defecting partner ('punishment'), or (iii) to stop interacting and switch partner ('partner switching'). However, such mechanisms to stabilize cooperation are often studied in isolation from each other. In order to better understand the conditions under which each partner control mechanism tends to be favoured by selection, we here analyse by way of individual-based simulations the coevolution between positive reciprocity, punishment, and partner switching. We show that random interactions in an unstructured population and a high number of rounds increase the likelihood that selection favours partner switching. In contrast, interactions localized in small groups (without genetic structure) increase the likelihood that selection favours punishment and/or positive reciprocity. This study thus highlights the importance of comparing different control mechanisms for cooperation under different conditions.

Punishment: one tool, many uses

“…Similarly, using a series of social dilemma tasks, Yamagishi and colleagues (2012) found that the tendency to reject unfair offers in the Ultimatum Game (which has been interpreted as a form of costly punishment owing to strong reciprocity preferences; Fehr and Fischbacher 2003; Fehr and Gächter 2002b; Gintis et al 2003) was unrelated to prosocial behaviour in other games (see also Albrecht et al 2018;Brañas-Garza et al 2014;Eriksson et al 2014;Hoeft and Mill 2017;Kriss et al 2016;Peysakhovich et al 2014). Thus, the preference for cooperation and for punishment does not appear to be as tightly linked as theories based on strong reciprocity preferences imply, and evolutionary simulations on two-player interactions obtain as an outcome of natural selection (Wubs et al 2016).…”

Why cooperation is not running away

“…In the theoretical literature on partner choice, relatively little attention has been given to these questions. First of all, a large proportion of models consider cooperation as an all-or-nothing decision and thus cannot study its quantitative level [4,5,25,37,39,40,48,53,62,89,94,108]. Second, some models consider cooperation as a quantitative trait but do not entail diminishing returns, and are thus ill-suited to study the social efficiency of cooperative interactions [51,74,88,92].…”

Pair bond endurance promotes cooperative food defense and inhibits conflict in coral reef butterflyfishes

“…For C. lunulatus, partners appear to work together simultaneously to provide mutual assistance, and as such, familiarity may facilitate learning and accurate prediction of partner behavior (e.g., chosen defense route or routine), thereby fine-tuning pair-wise coordination [65][66][67][68] . For C. baronessa, partners appear to exhibit male-prioritized assistance in exchange for sequentially reciprocated partitioning of services/resources by females (i.e., direct reciprocity), and as such, partner familiarity may allow individuals to learn which "partner control mechanism" is best suited to stabilize cooperation, based on the tendency of partners to reciprocate (or cheat) in the past 69,70 . Upon new pair formation, partner familiarity (and therefore effective co-operation, and co-operatively derived feeding benefits) takes several days to develop; however, the cost of food sharing is immediately incurred.…”