title: Unwritten rules: virtual bargaining underpins social interaction, culture, and society.
abstract: Many social interactions require humans to coordinate their behavior across a range of scales. However, aspects of intentional coordination remain puzzling from within several approaches in cognitive science. Sketching a new perspective, we propose that the complex behavioral patterns - or 'unwritten rules' - governing such coordination emerge from an ongoing process of 'virtual bargaining'. Social participants behave on the basis of what they would agree to do if they were explicitly to bargain, provided the agreement that would arise from such discussion is commonly known. Although intuitively simple, this interpretation has implications for understanding a broad spectrum of social, economic, and cultural phenomena (including joint action, team reasoning, communication, and language) that, we argue, depend fundamentally on the virtual bargains themselves.
authors: Behavioural Science Group, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK.
authors: Jennifer B
authors: JB
authors: Misyak
authors: Behavioural Science Group, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK.
authors: Tigran
authors: T
authors: Melkonyan
authors: Strategy and International Business, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK.
authors: Hossam
authors: H
authors: Zeitoun
authors: Behavioural Science Group, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK. Electronic address: nick.chater@wbs.ac.uk.
authors: Nick
authors: N
authors: Chater
mesh_terms: D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D003142:Communication; D032882:Comprehension; D003469:Culture; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations
keywords: coordination; culture; human communication; joint action; social interaction; virtual bargaining