Consequences of fluctuating group size for the evolution of cooperation

DOI10.1007/S00285-010-0367-3zbMATH Open1230.92035arXiv1010.5478OpenAlexW2004338520WikidataQ47409274 ScholiaQ47409274MaRDI QIDQ659026FDOQ659026

Authors: Åke Brännström, Thilo Gross, Bernd Blasius, Ulf Dieckmann 

Publication date: 9 February 2012

Published in: Journal of Mathematical Biology (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: Studies of cooperation have traditionally focused on discrete games such as the well-known prisoner's dilemma, in which players choose between two pure strategies: cooperation and defection. Increasingly, however, cooperation is being studied in continuous games that feature a continuum of strategies determining the level of cooperative investment. For the continuous snowdrift game, it has been shown that a gradually evolving monomorphic population may undergo evolutionary branching, resulting in the emergence of a defector strategy that coexists with a cooperator strategy. This phenomenon has been dubbed the 'tragedy of the commune'. Here we study the effects of fluctuating group size on the tragedy of the commune and derive analytical conditions for evolutionary branching. Our results show that the effects of fluctuating group size on evolutionary dynamics critically depend on the structure of payoff functions. For games with additively separable benefits and costs, fluctuations in group size make evolutionary branching less likely, and sufficiently large fluctuations in group size can always turn an evolutionary branching point into a locally evolutionarily stable strategy. For games with multiplicatively separable benefits and costs, fluctuations in group size can either prevent or induce the tragedy of the commune. For games with general interactions between benefits and costs, we derive a general classification scheme based on second derivatives of the payoff function, to elucidate when fluctuations in group size help or hinder cooperation.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/1010.5478

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Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Problems related to evolution (92D15) Evolutionary games (91A22) Other game-theoretic models (91A40)

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Cited In (21)

• The dynamics of casual groups can keep free-riders at bay
• The evolutionary advantages of group foraging
• On the size and structure of group cooperation
• Variability in group size and the evolution of collective action
• Evolutionary branching in deme-structured populations
• Dynamic-persistence of cooperation in public good games when group size is dynamic
• Evolutionary dynamics of collective action in spatially structured populations
• The hitchhiker's guide to adaptive dynamics
• Group size effects in social evolution
• On inferring evolutionary stability in finite populations using infinite population models
• Rewards based on public loyalty program promote cooperation in public goods game
• Individual-based competition between species with spatial correlation and aggregation
• The joint evolution of cooperation and competition
• The rise and fall of cooperation in populations with multiple groups
• Relationship between aggregation of rewards and the possibility of polymorphism in continuous snowdrift games
• Effect of the group size on the evolution of cooperation when an exit option is present
• Eco-evolutionary dynamics of social dilemmas
• Evolutionary stability in continuous nonlinear public goods games
• Public goods games in populations with fluctuating size
• Effects of relatedness on the evolution of cooperation in nonlinear public goods games
• Shared rewarding overcomes defection traps in generalized volunteer's dilemmas

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