Cooperation, Motivation and Social Balance

Arbeitspapier

This paper examines the reflexive interplay between individual decisions and social forces to analyze the evolution of cooperation in the presence of "multi-directedness," whereby people's preferences depend on their psychological motives. People have access to multiple, discrete motives. Different motives may be activated by different social settings. Inter-individual differences in dispositional types affect the responsiveness of people's motives to their social settings. The evolution of these dispositional types is driven by changes in the frequencies of social settings. In this context, economic policies can influence economic decisions not merely by modifying incentives operating through given preferences, but also by influencing people's motives (thereby changing their preferences) and by changing the distribution of dispositional types in the population (thereby changing their motivational responsiveness to social settings).

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 9703

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Relation of Economics to Social Values ; Noncooperative Games ; Microeconomic Behavior: Underlying Principles ; Externalities ; Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers
• Subject: motivation ; reflexivity ; cooperation ; social dilemma ; endogenous preferences ; dispositions

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Bosworth, Steven J. ; Singer, Tania ; Snower, Dennis J.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2016

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/141462
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET