Collective action is often the key to creating dramatic social or environmental changes, be it reducing pollution and waste, diminishing overfishing, or getting more scientists to openly share their data with others.
Collective action can involve social issues. The choice to act altruistically might come at a personal cost. Communication and cooperation are important to deal with these problems.
The new research sheds light on the best way to get people to cooperate.
In the world of economics, decisions about cooperation are often studied in laboratory games such as the prisoner's dilemma or the public goods game.
One of the best examples of a cooperative set up is the public goods game, where participants have to secretly choose how many of their private token to put into a public pot, which everyone can benefit from.
The social dilemma is caused by the fact that each member of a group is exposed to uncertainty, which is the fundamental source of the cooperative situation.
Even if an individual member is willing to share their resources, they cannot be sure if anyone else will. The first move to cooperate can be seen as altruistic if you take a chance.
It might be disappointing to know that others won't cooperate. Some may opt for free-load, which is to cooperate less and still benefit from the actions of others. Scientists view the first move to do so as selfish.
What do people do in those situations? It depends on a number of factors, for instance the social status of the group, as well as the type of resources they are giving up.
In reality, the decisions of this kind are often made in discussions with others. The communication aspect can be crucial. Communication gives group members a chance to persuade their peers to act in a way that is in line with their intentions.
Another form of uncertainty is presented by this. We know that people do not always do what they say. They might be signaling virtue by talking in ways that promote themselves as good and good looking, without actually intending to cooperate.
90 people were assigned to groups of five to look at the effects of communication on cooperation. Each member of the group had to squeeze a hand grip device multiple times in order to get a small reward.
Each member of the group had the option to contribute to the group pot or keep the money for themselves. Half of the money in the group pot was more than what could be earned individually.
Two other elements of the experiment helped us understand the influence of communication on cooperative behavior.
Under certain circumstances, participants had to decide whether to cooperate. In the possible virtue signaling condition, each member had to state before they performed the task how many times they intended to share money they had earned, and were told that this information would be communicated to the rest of the group.
Each member was told that the number of times they shared the money would be communicated to the rest of the group. No information was given to the rest of the group in the flying blind condition.
All five members of the group entered into a group chat online where they could discuss the task and the information that was presented to them, at least for two conditions.
They were paid the amount that they had personally earned and the amount that the group had earned after they performed the task again.
People were more likely to cooperate during the possible virtue signaling and money in your mouth conditions than in the flying blind condition. Knowing that your intentions would be passed on made a difference. How much of the difference was determined by what was said in the group chat?
There was a relationship between how much the group cooperated and how much they did not. When people said things that helped the group reach a consensus, they acted together.
Our study shows that avoiding phrases that indicate hedging and equivocation helps people cooperate.
Being vague about the extent of your intended contribution will make people distrust you and reduce the number of people in your group. This will make it harder for the group to reach an agreement to cooperate.
A transcript of discussion from the experiment. The author is provided.
An explicit and specific promise about your contribution is what can be seen in the example above.
It is important to pose a direct question to the entire group, which asks about everyone's intended contribution. If someone ignores the question, it is a useful signal.
Communication styles can make a difference. Speaking in a way that shows solidarity and authority will strengthen the group and establish a norm to cooperate. Warming and humor help.
We found that groups that used more formal and self-interested communication styles, such as those associated with the world of business and politics, were less cooperative.
Showing strong leadership through assertive statements, expressing encouragement through motivational phrases, and making people feel part of your group are all good first steps in getting others to cooperate.
The Principal Research Associate in Basic and Applied Decision Making is Magda Osman.
This article is free to use under a Creative Commons license. The original article is worth a read.
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