Between-group conflict and other-regarding preferences in nested social dilemmas

Arbeitspapier

We investigate experimentally the underlying motivations and individual dierences with regard to the participation in between-group conflict in nested social dilemmas. In our nested social dilemmas, the collective is divided into two groups, and individuals allocate tokens between a private, a group-specific, and a collective good. We vary the marginal per capita return of the group-specific and collective good in order to manipulate the motivational within- and between group conflicts. A first experiment shows that a between-group conflict leads to within-group cooperation and particularly individuals with positive other-regarding preferences (prosocials) react to a between-group conflict by contributing to the group-specific good. Hence, paradoxically, individuals with positive other-regarding preferences may foster between-group conflicts. A second experiment reveals that prosocials' contributions to the group-specific or collective good vary as a function of the personal costs of within-group versus collective cooperation, supporting the weighted average social preference theory by Charness and Rabin (2002).

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• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Jena Economic Research Papers ; No. 2014-011

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Noncooperative Games ; Design of Experiments: Laboratory, Group Behavior ; Public Goods
• Subject: between-group conflict ; local and global public goods ; nested social dilemma ; other-regarding preferences

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Böhm, Robert ; Bornstein, Gary ; Koppel, Hannes
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Max Planck Institute of Economics
• (where): Jena
• (when): 2014

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/98459