Human behavior in Prisoner's Dilemma experiments suppresses network reciprocity

• DOI: 10.1038/srep00325
• Publication Date: 2012-03-22T20:09:41Z
• Authors: Carlos Gracia-Lázaro; José A. Cuesta; Angel Sánchez; Yamir Moreno
• Keywords: Social and Information Networks (cs.SI); FOS: Computer and information sciences; Physics - Physics and Society; Behavior; 0303 health sciences; Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech); Mathematics and computing; Matemáticas; Prisoners; Evolutionary theory; FOS: Physical sciences; Computer Science - Social and Information Networks; Thermodynamics and nonlinear dynamics; Physics and Society (physics.soc-ph); Modelling and theory Statistical physics; Article; 03 medical and health sciences; Thermodynamics and nonlinear dynamic; Humans; Theory; Statistical physics; Theoretical physics; Mathematics; Condensed Matter - Statistical Mechanics

During the last few years, much research has been devoted to strategic interactions on complex networks. In this context, the Prisoner's Dilemma has become a paradigmatic model, and it has been established that imitative evolutionary dynamics lead to very different outcomes depending on the details of the network. We here report that when one takes into account the real behavior of people observed in the experiments, both at the mean-field level and on utterly different networks the observed level of cooperation is the same. We thus show that when human subjects interact in an heterogeneous mix including cooperators, defectors and moody conditional cooperators, the structure of the population does not promote or inhibit cooperation with respect to a well mixed population.<br/>5 Pages including 4 figures. Submitted for publication<br/>