Costly punishment across human societies.
Recent behavioral experiments aimed at understanding the evolutionary foundations of human cooperation have suggested that a willingness to engage in costly punishment, even in one-shot situations, may be part of human psychology and a key element in understanding our sociality. However, because most experiments have been confined to students in industrialized societies, generalizations of these insights to the species have necessarily been tentative. Here, experimental results from 15 diverse populations show that (i) all populations demonstrate some willingness to administer costly punishment as unequal behavior increases, (ii) the magnitude of this punishment varies substantially across populations, and (iii) costly punishment positively covaries with altruistic behavior across populations. These findings are consistent with models of the gene-culture coevolution of human altruism and further sharpen what any theory of human cooperation needs to explain.
Henrich
Joseph
J
Department of Anthropology, Emory University, 1557 Dickey Drive, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA. jhenric@emory.edu
McElreath
Richard
R
Barr
Abigail
A
Ensminger
Jean
J
Barrett
Clark
C
Bolyanatz
Alexander
A
Cardenas
Juan Camilo
JC
Gurven
Michael
M
Gwako
Edwins
E
Henrich
Natalie
N
Lesorogol
Carolyn
C
Marlowe
Frank
F
Tracer
David
D
Ziker
John
J
D000349:Africa; D000367:Age Factors; D000533:Altruism; D005075:Biological Evolution; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D003468:Cultural Evolution; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D005717:Games, Experimental; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008542:Melanesia; D011678:Punishment; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012737:Sex Factors; D012800:Siberia; D012919:Social Behavior; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013020:South America; D014481:United States