Journal article

Reducing the heterogeneity of payoffs: an effective way to promote cooperation in the prisoner's dilemma game

  • Jiang, Luo-Luo Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
  • Zhao, Ming Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
  • Yang, Han-Xin Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
  • Wakeling, Joseph Rushton Department of Physics, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
  • Wang, Bing-Hong Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China - The Research Center for Complex System Science, University of Shanghai for Science and Technology and Shanghai Academy of System Science, China
  • Zhou, Tao Department of Modern Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China - Department of Physics, University of Fribourg, Switzerland
Show more…
    28.09.2009
Published in:
  • Physical Review E. - 2009, vol. 80, p. 031144
English In this paper, the accumulated payoff of each agent is regulated so as to reduce the heterogeneity of the distribution of all such payoffs. It is found that there exists an optimal regulation strength at which cooperation in the prisoner's dilemma game is optimally promoted. If the heterogeneity is regulated to be either too weak or too strong, the promotive effect disappears and the evolution of cooperation may even be impaired if compared to the absence of the proposed regulatory mechanism. An explanation of the observed results is provided. In particular, it is found that cooperators on the spatial grid are not isolated but form compact clusters and that the distribution of these clusters is crucial for the promotion of cooperation. Our work provides insights into relations between the distribution of payoffs and the evolution of cooperative behavior in situations constituting a social dilemma.
Faculty
Faculté des sciences et de médecine
Department
Département de Physique
Language
  • English
Classification
Physics
License
License undefined
Identifiers
Persistent URL
https://folia.unifr.ch/unifr/documents/301373
Statistics

Document views: 44 File downloads:
  • zhou_rhp.pdf: 69