Communication, commitment, and cooperation in social dilemma.

Abstract

Intragroup communication promotes cooperation in social dilemmas. Two explanations are plausible: Discussion may (a) enhance feelings of group identity or (b) induce commitments to cooperate. Some remedies for social dilemmas (like group communication) may be subclassified as publicwelfare remedies (of which enhanced group identity is an example) versus cooperation-contingent remedies (of which commitment is an example). The efficacy of a cooperative act for enhancing the collective welfare should moderate remedies of the former but not the latter type. An experiment is reported in which group communication and the efficacy of cooperation were manipulated. As expected if communication induced commitments, but contrary to the group identity explanation, efficacy did not moderate the effect of group discussion. Other analyses provided more direct evidence that group members made and honored commitments to cooperate.

Group membership, team preferences, and expectations

“…See e.g. Tajfel (1982), Brewer and Kramer (1986), Isaac and Walker (1988), Orbell et al (1988), Dawes et al (1990), Kerr and Kauffmann-Gilliland (1994); the social psychology literature is surveyed in Brown (2000) and Hogg and Abrams (2003). We will use the term "minimal group" rather broadly, to include a number of experiments that differ in some respects from Tajfel's.…”

Communication, cooperation and collusion in team tournaments—An experimental study

“…Even in cases where communication is 'cheap talk' in the sense that players' messages have no direct payoff implications, economic theory has shown that communication has a large potential to increase the cooperation of interacting players (see, e.g., Rabin, 1994;Farrell, 1995;Farrell and Rabin, 1996;Crawford, 1998 Social psychology has shown that the higher levels of cooperation with communication (than without it) can be explained by two main factors: first, the opportunity to make commitments (even when they are not enforceable) and, second, the possibility to increase the degree of group identity through communication (Brickman, 1987;Orbell et al, 1988;Dawes et al, 1990;Kerr and Kaufman-Gilliland, 1994). Elster (1986, pp.…”

How to overcome the detrimental effects of noise in social interaction: The benefits of generosity.

“…Hence, individuals may explain discrepancies between intentions and actual behavior in an effort to prevent or resolve misunderstanding and to promote cooperation and quality of interaction outcomes (e.g., "I did not mean to hurt you"). Research could address the benefits of communication (e.g., the content, timing, and credibility of communication) in noisy social dilemmas, which is likely to contribute to the classic discussion about the functions of communication in social dilemmas (e.g., Kerr & Kaufman-Gilliland, 1994;Orbell, Van de Kragt, & Dawes, 1988). A related topic for future research is noise as an excuse, whereby individuals communicate noise to convey cooperative intentions even if the intentions were not cooperative; that is, if noise was absent (e.g., embellishing congestion on freeways as an excuse for arriving late).…”