Social diversity and promotion of cooperation in the spatial prisoner’s dilemma game

The diversity in wealth and social status is present not only among humans, but throughout the animal world. We account for this observation by generating random variables that determine the social diversity of players engaging in the prisoner's dilemma game. Here the term social diversity is used to address extrinsic factors that determine the mapping of game payoffs to individual fitness. These factors may increase or decrease the fitness of a player depending on its location on the spatial grid. We consider different distributions of extrinsic factors that determine the social diversity of players, and find that the power-law distribution enables the best promotion of cooperation. The facilitation of the…

• FN
  Fonds National de la Recherche Luxembourg
• JA
  Javna Agencija za Raziskovalno Dejavnost RS