title: Survival via cooperation in the prisoner's dilemma game.
abstract: By incorporating ecological dynamics into evolutionary games, we introduce natural and unnatural death to the spatial prisoner's dilemma game in which individuals can play mixed strategies. This introduction can give a simple explanation for the emergence and abundance of cooperation in animal and human societies. We found that individuals are more likely to cooperate in a highly competitive environment. In addition, our simulation results suggest that the individuals would tend to cooperate when the temptation to defect is small.
authors.affiliation: School of Science, Tianjin University of Technology, Tianjin 300384, China.
authors.forename: Zhaojin
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Haizhao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhi
authors.forename: Lianzhong
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D005075:Biological Evolution; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D055669:Ecological and Environmental Phenomena; D005716:Game Theory; D056084:Genetic Fitness; D006801:Humans; D012641:Selection, Genetic