Endogenous rewards promote cooperation

Abstract

SignificanceAn important research area in the social and biological sciences is how endogenous sanctions can promote cooperation in social dilemma situations, particularly in a budget-balanced (no need for external financing) manner. Punishment has had some success in experimental studies, but has serious shortcomings: It is socially wasteful materially and also tends to induce poor social relations. Reward avoids those issues and reinforces the social fabric. Our mechanism achieves high contributions in a public goods game (PGG) with peer reward in a budget-balanced tax-funding environment; notably, our environment also reverses the downward trend of the standard PGG. This research advances the field in a direction that will be important for practical policy applications, opening the door for further interesting and socially beneficial research.

The competitive advantage of institutional reward

“…Since the entry fee in our model is compulsory, a subsequent question is whether real players will choose such an incentive institution. A recent experimental study indicated that approximately half of the subjects would like to pay 20% of their wealth for a reward mechanism before playing the PGG [61]. This finding suggests that the incentive institution we proposed could be sustainable.…”

A Viewpoint on Chemical Reductions of Carbon–Oxygen Bonds in Renewable Feedstocks Including CO2 and Biomass

“…For example, the hydrogenation of CO 2 to formic acid is entropically disfavored (ΔH 0 = −31.2 kJ mol −1 and ΔG 0 = +32.9 kJ mol −1 at 25 °C and pH = 0), and common strategies to alleviate this thermodynamic hurdle require the use of a stoichiometric amount of a Brønsted base (for NH 3(aq) , ΔH 0 = −84.3 kJ mol −1 and ΔG 0 = −9.5 kJ mol −1 at 25 °C) or highly polar solvents such as dimethyl sulfoxide or water (in water, ΔG 0 = −4.0 kJ mol −1 at 25 °C). 22 While the state-of-the-art is still dominated by noble-metal-based catalysts, 23 iron-or copper-based catalysts have emerged as potent candidates to promote this reaction. 24 Even more challenging is the hydrogenation of CO 2 to methanol, which is a kinetically difficult yet slightly exergonic reaction (ΔG 0 = −17.3 kJ mol −1 at 25 °C and pH = 0).…”

Reputation effects drive the joint evolution of cooperation and social rewarding

“…In this study, we revisit the literature on the interplay between cooperation and (peer) rewarding 17 – 28 . This literature explores whether individuals become more cooperative when others can compensate them for their cooperative behaviors.…”