In this paper we explore the relationship between the individual’s preference for cooperation and the establishment of cooperative norms. Our aim is to provide an experimental test of the evolutionary hypothesis (see Carpenter, 2004, Fehr and Gachter 2002; Gintis 2000; Boyd, Bowles, Gintis and...

We present a wide collection of experiments which show how human behavior deviates substantially with respect to the predictions derived from standard homo economicus assumptions. Then we review the theoretical literature that this evidence has stimulated. In particular some models are found to...

From a purely theoretical perspective, there is no reason to expect that different levels of contributions in public goods games are associated with the same sanctioning/rewarding rule. The efficiency of a norm should be independent of its enactment procedure. On the contrary, multidisciplinary...

This paper studies whether prosocial values are transmitted from parents to their children. We do so through an economic experiment, in which a group of Hispanic and African American families play a standard public goods game. The experimental data presents us with a surprising result. We find...

In low income countries grass-root collective action is a well known substitute for government provision of public goods. In our research we wonder what is its effect on the law of motion of social capital, a crucial microeconomic determinant of economic development. To this purpose we structure...

This is an experiment on the effect of norm application in a public good game. We want to investigate whether a control norm affects the contribution level differently, only in relation to the way in which the norm is applied in the game. We compare the amount of public good provided in two...

Due to its long-lasting internal armed conflict, Colombia has witnessed a rupture in social networks. The network composition was altered for municipalities with high in- or out-flows of displaced individuals, in addition to the individual impact on the displaced. We use a controlled laboratory...

We model the coevolution of behavioral strategies and social learning rules in the context of a cooperative dilemma, a situation in which individuals must decide whether or not to subordinate their own interests to those of the group. There are two learning rules in our model, conformism and...

We show in a public goods experiment on three continents that conditional cooperation is a universal behavioral regularity. Yet, the number of conditional cooperators and the extent of conditional cooperation are much higher in the U.S.A. than anywhere else.