Public Goods Quiz

Situational Determinants of Altruism

• Diffusion of Responsibility: The feeling of responsibility diminishes as the number of bystanders increases. The presence of others may lead people to assume someone else will take action. An experiment studied epileptic seizure reactions. The proportion of help declined, and the time it took to get help increased, with more bystanders.

• Pluralistic Ignorance: People unsure how to act in a situation will use other's behavior to guide their actions. Based on social comparison theory, we use others as a guide when unsure of the appropriate behavior. An example of this is the "smoke-filled room" experiment by Darley and Latane' (1968). In this experiment, only 10% of participants intervened in a smoke-filled room, even thought it was a clear emergency.

• Cost of Helping/Not Helping: There are personal costs to not helping, including empathy costs of not helping (the cost of not helping when feeling empathic concern of the victim) and personal costs, such as the norm of reciprocity (expectation for helping those who helped you), social responsibility (helping those dependent on you) or the cost of potential risk or danger associated with helping.

• Altruistic Views: Empathy is a view that motivates helping behavior. When we empathize with someone in distress, our goal is to reduce their distress.

Bystander-Calculus Model

• Physiological Arousal: Arousal is triggered by witnessing others' suffering and distress; the clarity and interpretation of the situation influence arousal.
• Intensity: Individuals with higher arousal (e.g., faster heart rate) are more likely to help than those with lower arousal (e.g., slower heart rate). This is a factor in how people respond to emergencies.

Stupid Ladder Experiment

• Participants interact via intercom with each other to develop a bond
• Different levels of push-ups create varying levels of physiological arousal. The levels of arousal are triggered by situational information heard by the subject, for example a verbal statement or startling sound.

Costs of Helping & Not Helping

• Empathy costs of not helping: The cost of not helping when feeling empathic concern of the victim.
• Personal costs of not helping: Norms influence our decision to help. Norms include reciprocity (helping those who have helped you, or expectation that helping others will get returned) and social responsibility (expectation of helping those dependent upon you).

Empathy-Altruism Model

• Witnessing others in distress: Creates two reactions:
  • Distress: Unpleasant; motivation is to reduce our own distress (egoistic).
  • Empathy: Directs attention to others' distress; motivation to reduce others' distress (altruistic).

Empathic Joy (EJ) Hypothesis

• We enjoy others' relief at being helped.
• Empathy leads us to help others because we want to feel that others are happy, not just to improve our own mood.
• If we cannot witness the "happy ending," we may not help.

Cover Story

• Students perceive coping methods in university environments.
• Some tasks include watching interviews of freshmen and evaluate methods to cope with adjustment problems.
• The subject is the only one who can respond to the interview.

Empathy Manipulation

• Increase empathic emotion in subjects watching videos by focusing on the body-language and expressions of those involved in the video.
• The subject is to watch what the person does in the video and imagine how they feel.

The Ultimatum Game

• Two people share a resource (e.g., $26).
• Player A makes an allocation.
• Player B either accepts or vetoes the allocation
• If B accepts, A and B get what A proposed. If B vetoes - A and B get nothing

Social Norms

• Equality Norm: Everyone should get the same.
• Equity Norm: One person's input to output ratio should be equal to the other.
• Needs Norm: Those who need more receive more.

Mixed-Motive Interactions

• Management-labor relations.
• Social Dilemmas (public/common, reciprocity)
• Social Exchange Theory.
• Solving social dilemmas (communication/coordination)

The Game of Chicken

• Two cars approach each other
• Each driver either jumps (swerves) or does not jump.
• Both players cooperating on not swerving leads to a peaceful outcome, but if both decide to not swerve a collision occurs.

Social Exchange Theory

• The premise is quantifying gains/losses in interactions to predict/explain behaviors.
• Modeling relationships (acquaintances/business partners); wanting to maximize gain.

The Game of Chicken (Golden Ball Example)

• Two drivers approach each other.
• Outcome matrix
• Depending on whether they jump, outcome = peace , hero, chicken or dead.

The Game of Nuclear Chicken

• Two countries (e.g. the U.S. and the Soviet Union)
• Outcomes = Withdrawal or maintenance (M) of their missiles.
• Blockade (B) or Air strike (A)
• Outcomes include negotiation, compromise, or Nuclear War

Prisoner's Dilemma Game (PDG)

• Two individuals arrested for a crime.
• They can cooperate or defect.
• Matrix shows payoffs
• Defect always better individually but mutual defection leads to a worse collective outcome than mutual cooperation, which is better than mutual defection.

The Tit-For-Tat Strategy

• A cooperative strategy (PDG).
• Cooperation on the first turn.
• On subsequent turns, imitate opponent's previous response.
• TFT is a reciprocal strategy.

The Evolution of Cooperation

• Computer simulations demonstrating the cooperation of several approaches.
• Initial rounds demonstrate the dominance of defection
• Over time, approaches/strategies that demonstrated cooperation are more populated.
• Nice strategies, forgiving strategies were more successful.

How to Do Well in an Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma Game (PDG)

• Don’t be envious.
• Don’t be the first to defect.
• Reciprocate both cooperation and defection.
• Don’t be too clever; rule sets should be clear and easily understood.

Other Concepts

• Behavior matrices
• Interdependence
• Hedonistic principle.

Common Resource Pool Dilemma

• A fixed resource pool shared by multiple individuals.
• Each person makes a simultaneous request.
• If the total request is less than or equal to the resource pool size, each person gets their requested amount.
• If the total request is greater than the resource pool size, no one gets any of the resource.

Simultaneous Protocol

• All players make decisions at the same time.
• No information about other players' decisions.
• All players have the same information.

Sequential Protocol

• Players take turns making decisions following a pre-determined sequence.
• Common knowledge of previous decisions.
• Knowledge of own position and remaining resources

Real-Time Protocol

• Order of play and timing of decisions are predetermined by players.
• Makes a decision within a fixed/irrevocable time interval.
• Instantaneous updates of other players' decisions are available.

Choose Number Game

• Participants have to choose between 1 and 7.
• The minimum of all choices is the outcome relevant for all involved.

Coordination Game

• Participants choose between 1 to 7.
• The result is based on the minimum number selected between each participant.

Volunteer's Dilemma (M=1)

• Individuals must decide whether to contribute to a shared good or not.
• Contribute can lead to a positive or negative reward or penalty based on others' contributions or non-contributions.

Criticality

• A person is in a critical situation if and only if his or her contribution is required to provide the PG.

Percieved Self-Efficacy

• The belief that you have about the effect of your actions.
• Group Success depend on best versus worst performing member.