Cited by 473Evolutionary Game Theory and CooperationExperimental Behavioral Economics StudiesEvolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior

Altruistic punishment and the origin of cooperation

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Fowler, James H.·2005·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Abstract

How did human cooperation evolve? Recent evidence shows that many people are willing to engage in altruistic punishment, voluntarily paying a cost to punish noncooperators. Although this behavior helps to explain how cooperation can persist, it creates an important puzzle. If altruistic punishment provides benefits to nonpunishers and is costly to punishers, then how could it evolve? Drawing on recent insights from voluntary public goods games, I present a simple evolutionary model in which altruistic punishers can enter and will always come to dominate a population of contributors, defectors, and nonparticipants. The model suggests that the cycle of strategies in voluntary public goods games does not persist in the presence of punishment strategies. It also suggests that punishment can only enforce payoff-improving strategies, contrary to a widely cited “folk theorem” result that suggests that punishment can allow the evolution of any strategy.

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Crossref · 10.1073/pnas.0500938102

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  • Altruistic punishment is a prominent solution to the challenge of free riding.

    “Free riding poses a major challenge to self-governance, and a prominent solution to this challenge has been altruistic punishment.”

    From Cooperation without punishment (2023) · cites this paper as [33]

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Authors
Fowler, J. H.
Affiliations
University of California, Davis (US)
Corresponding author
Fowler, James H.
Venue
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Published
2005-04-27
Volume
102
Issue
19
Pages
7047-7049
ISSN
  • 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
  • 1091-6490
OpenAlex
W2150737844
Cited by
473
References
20
Citations by year
2026: 14 · 2025: 13 · 2024: 16 · 2023: 22 · 2022: 28 · 2021: 30 · 2020: 17 · 2019: 26 · 2018: 31 · 2017: 40 · 2016: 13 · 2015: 24 · 2014: 35 · 2013: 34 · 2012: 27
FWCI
51.03
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation
  • Social Sciences › Safety Research › Experimental Behavioral Economics Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
Keywords
altruistic punishment, evolution of cooperation, evolutionary game theory, folk theorem, punishment strategies, defectors, non-participants
MeSH terms
Altruism, Behavior, Cooperative Behavior, Biological Evolution, Game Theory, Humans, Interpersonal Relations, Models, Theoretical, Population Dynamics, Punishment, Social Behavior

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