Alle Publikationen
2018
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(2018): Spillover modes in multiplex games. Double-edged effects on cooperation and their coevolution. In: Scientific reports 8 (1). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-25025-3
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29720679 Abstract: In recent years, there has been growing interest in studying games on multiplex networks that account for interactions across linked social contexts. However, little is known about how potential cross-context interference, or spillover, of individual behavioural strategy impact overall cooperation. We consider three plausible spillover modes, quantifying and comparing their effects on the evolution of cooperation. In our model, social interactions take place on two network layers: repeated interactions with close neighbours in a lattice, and one-shot interactions with random individuals. Spillover can occur during the learning process with accidental cross-layer strategy transfer, or during social interactions with errors in implementation. Our analytical results, using extended pair approximation, are in good agreement with extensive simulations. We find double-edged effects of spillover: increasing the intensity of spillover can promote cooperation provided cooperation is favoured in one layer, but too much spillover is detrimental. We also discover a bistability phenomenon: spillover hinders or promotes cooperation depending on initial frequencies of cooperation in each layer. Furthermore, comparing strategy combinations emerging in each spillover mode provides good indication of their co-evolutionary dynamics with cooperation. Our results make testable predictions that inspire future research, and sheds light on human cooperation across social domains.
Keywords: COMMONS, Disziplin, EVOLUTIONARY GAMES, Favoriten, GRAPHS, Interaction, Interaktion, interference of social interaction, Kooperation, Mathematik, NETWORKS, Netzwerk, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, social interaction, Soziale Angemessenheit, Soziologie, spillover effects, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten -
(2018): Virtual Character Facial Expressions Influence Human Brain and Facial EMG Activity in a Decision-Making Game. In: IEEE Transactions on Affective Computing 9 (2), S. 285-298. DOI: 10.1109/TAFFC.2016.2601101
Abstract: We examined the effects of the emotional facial expressions of a virtual character (VC) on human frontal electroencephalographic (EEG) asymmetry (putatively indexing approach/withdrawal motivation), facial electromyographic (EMG) activity (emotional expressions), and social decision making (cooperation/defection). In a within-subjects design, the participants played the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game with VCs with different dynamic facial expressions (predefined or dependent on the participant's electrodermal and facial EMG activity). In general, VC facial expressions elicited congruent facial muscle activity. However, both frontal EEG asymmetry and facial EMG activity elicited by an angry VC facial expression varied as a function of preceding interactional events (human collaboration/defection). Pre-decision inner emotional-motivational processes and emotional facial expressions were dissociated, suggesting that human goals influence pre-decision frontal asymmetry, whereas display rules may affect (pre-decision) emotional expressions in human-VC interaction. An angry VC facial expression, high pre-decision corrugator EMG activity, and relatively greater left frontal activation predicted the participant's decision to defect. Both post-decision frontal asymmetry and facial EMG activity were related to reciprocal cooperation. The results suggest that the justifiability of VC emotional expressions and the perceived fairness of VC actions influence human emotional responses.
2017
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(2017): Exposure to Hedione Increases Reciprocity in Humans. In: Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience 11. DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2017.00079
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28512400 Abstract: Cooperation among unrelated humans is frequently regarded as a defining feature in the evolutionary success of our species. Whereas, much research has addressed the strategic and cognitive mechanisms that underlie cooperation, investigations into chemosensory processes have received very limited research attention. To bridge that gap, we build on recent research that has identified the chemically synthesized odorant Hedione (HED) as a ligand for the putative human pheromone receptor (VN1R1) expressed in the olfactory mucosa, and hypothesize that exposure to HED may increase reciprocity. Applying behavioral economics paradigms, the present research shows that exposure to the ligand causes differentiated behavioral effects in reciprocal punishments (Study 1) as well as rewards (Study 2), two types of behaviors that are frequently regarded as essential for the development and maintenance of cooperation.
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(2017): Group Pleasures: Collaborative Commitments, Shared Narrative, and the Sociology of Fun. In: Sociological Theory 35 (1), S. 64-86. DOI: 10.1177/0735275117692836
Abstract: As a consequence of their size and fragility, small groups depend on cohesion. Central to group continuation are occasions of collective hedonic satisfaction that encourage attachment. These times are popularly labeled fun. While groupness can be the cause of fun, we emphasize the effects of fun, as understood by participants. Shared enjoyment, located in temporal and spatial affordances, creates conditions for communal identification. Such moments serve as commitment devices, building affiliation, modeling positive relations, and moderating interpersonal tension. Further, they encourage retrospective narration, providing an appealing past, an assumed future, and a sense of groupness. The rhetoric of fun supports interactional smoothness in the face of potential ruptures. Building on the authors' field observations and other ethnographies, we argue that both the experience and recall of fun bolster group stability. We conclude by suggesting that additional research must address the role of power and boundary building in the fun moment.
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(2017): On the transformative character of collective intentionality and the uniqueness of the human. In: Philosophical Psychology 30 (3), S. 319-337. DOI: 10.1080/09515089.2017.1295648
Abstract: Current debates on collective intentionality focus on the cognitive capacities, attitudes, and mental states that enable individuals to take part in joint actions. It is typically assumed that collective intentionality is a capacity which is added to other, pre-existing, capacities of an individual and is exercised in cooperative activities like carrying a table or painting a house together. We call this the additive account because it portrays collective intentionality as a capacity that an individual possesses in addition to her capacity for individual intentionality. We offer an alternative view according to which the primary entity to which collective intentionality has to be ascribed is not the human individual, but a “form of life.” As a feature of a form of life, collective intentionality is something more than the specific capacity exercised by an individual when she cooperates with others. Collective intentionality transforms all the capacities of the bearers of this specific form of life. We thus call our proposal the transformative account of collective intentionality.
Keywords: deutsche Community, Im (wissenschaftlichen) Diskurs, Intentionalität, Joint Action / Collective Agency, kollektive Intentionalität, Kooperation, Mensch und Maschine, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Ontologische Differenzierungen: Tier, Mensch, Maschine, Philosophical Psychology, Reflexionen über MTR, soziale Kognition, Spezifika von Menschen, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten -
(2017): Cooperation Via Intimidation. An Emergent System of Mutual Threats can Maintain Social Order. In: Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation 20 (4). DOI: 10.18564/jasss.3336
Abstract: Can human aggressiveness promote peaceful cooperation? Despite the seeming contradiction of these phenomena, our study suggests the answer is yes. We develop two agent-based models of cooperative interactions among aggressive agents threatening each other. In Model 1, we show that aggressive displays performed by dominance-seeking individuals create a system of mutual threats that effectively enforces cooperation and inhibits agents from escalating conflicts. This happens because agents observe each other fighting, which deters them from attacking each other due to aggressive reputations. In Model 2 we extend this effect to third-party interventions showing that forming alliances makes attacks more efficient and promotes the emergence of common rules determining whom to fight against. In such a state, social order is maintained by the existence of moral alliances - groups of agents willing to fight against norm violators. In summary, we argue that reputation for toughness and the aggressive predisposition of humans could have played an important role in the evolution of cooperation and moral systems.
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(2017): Buddhism, identity, and class. Fairness and favoritism in the Tyva Republic. In: Religion, Brain & Behavior 8 (2), S. 205-226. DOI: 10.1080/2153599X.2016.1267031
Abstract: Current research suggests that commitment to moralistic, omniscient, and punitive gods may contribute to the evolution of cooperation. As they may curb antisocial behaviors that incur costly social repercussions, supernatural punishment may help stabilize reciprocal relationships among peers. One recent elaboration of this hypothesis posits that commitment to such gods may boost prosociality to the point that it expands cooperation beyond one's family and local community. Using three permutations of an experimental game designed to measure impartial fairness, the present study tests this hypothesis among Buddhists from the Tyva Republic. Contrary to the expanded sociality hypothesis, we found that key features of local spirits and Buddha systematically predict favoritism toward co-religionists from one's community rather than fairness toward co-religionists from distant towns. Moreover, important indicators of class - years of formal education, material insecurity, and fluency in the Tyvan language - also predict favoritism toward local Buddhists rather than geographically distant Buddhists. We used a Buddhist protection charm as a prime condition that showed no simple effects across games, but did interact with key religious variables. Importantly, when players had a stake in the game and played against anonymous, geographically distant Buddhists, if the experiment reminded them of the Buddhist temple or charity, they were fairer toward the distant co-religionist.
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(2017) : Grundriss einer sozialpsychologischen Respekttheorie Hogrefe Verlag . Online verfügbar unter https://econtent.hogrefe.com/doi/10.1026/0033-3042/a000326 , zuletzt geprüft am 23.02.2018
Abstract: Outline of a Social Psychological Theory of Respect: Implications for Cooperation and Conflict in Pluralistic Societies Abstract. In this article, I outline a social psychological theory of respect with a particular emphasis on the importance of respect for social life in pluralistic societies. Building on social recognition approaches in social philosophy, I first elaborate on a conception of respect as equality recognition. Subsequently, I discuss empirical findings from our own program of research, which validate the proposed respect concept and illuminate important social consequences of respect (as well as of disrespect). I close with some considerations regarding the dynamics of respect and possible trajectories of politicized struggles for recognition in pluralistic societies.
2016
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(2016): Gene-culture interaction and the evolution of the human sense of fairness. In: Scientific reports 6. DOI: 10.1038/srep32483
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27562008 Abstract: How Darwinian evolution would produce creatures with the proclivity of Darwinian generosity, most of them voluntarily giving up the immediate benefit for themselves or their genes, remains a puzzle. This study targets a problem, the origin of human sense of fairness, and uses fairness-related genes and the social manipulation of Darwinian generosity as the key variables underlying the human sense of fairness, inequity aversion, as well as their relationships within cooperation, and the anticipation foresight of the way relationships are affected by resource division, given the assumption of randomly matched partners. Here we suggest a model in which phenotype will gradually converge towards the perfect sense of fairness along with the prospect of cooperation. Later, the sense of fairness will decrease but it is never extinct. Where social manipulation of Darwinian generosity overshadows genetics, the sense of fairness could be acute to the degree of social manipulation. Above all, there still exists a threshold in the degree of social manipulation, beyond which altruism dominates selfishness in human cooperation. Finally, we propose three new directions toward more realistic scenarios stimulated by recent development of the synergy between statistical physics, network science and evolutionary game theory.
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(2016): A love story: For ’Buddy System’ research in the academy. In: Gender, Place & Culture 23 (12), S. 1689-1700
Abstract: This article makes a case for a 'buddy system' approach to research and scholarship, or a kind of 'caring with' our colleagues, as feminist praxis and as an intentional, politicized response to the neoliberalization of the academy. Through autoethnographic writing on our travels together into farmed animal auction yards, we explain the buddy system as a mode of caring, solidarity, and love that differs from collaborative research, focused as it is on caring for and about our colleagues and their research even (or especially) when we have no direct stakes in the research being conducted. We contribute to three feminist conversations with this approach: feminist care ethics in geography; emotional geographies; and critical perspectives on the neoliberalization of the academy. We advocate the buddy system as an extension of feminist care ethics, enriching how feminists think about 'doing' research. We draw on feminist geographies of emotion and our own emotions (grief especially) experienced while witnessing processes of nonhuman animal commodification to politicize the act of researching and to develop a more caring way of inhabiting the academy. This is particularly important, we argue, in the context of deepening neoliberal logics that turn the academy into a place where care and love become radical acts of resistance and transformation.
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(2016): Rawlsian altruism with perfect discrimination leads to social efficiency. In: The Journal of Mathematical Sociology 40 (1), S. 53-69. DOI: 10.1080/0022250X.2015.1118098
Abstract: Recent studies draw attention on the highly specialized capacity of human beings in recognizing altruists versus cheaters in social interactions. These results hint at the existence of specialized abilities that support discriminating behavior in strategic interactions. In this paper, we explore the implications of discriminating behavior in the study of the indirect evolutionary selection of selfish versus altruistic motivations in the context of generic 2x2 base games, and in particular for coordination and cooperation scenarios. We find that inequality averse (Rawlsian) altruism can enforce under rather general conditions socially optimal outcomes, including cases where selfishness cannot, such as in prisoner's dilemmas. Inequality seeking (Nietzschian) altruism in no case improves upon Rawlsian altruism in terms of social optimality of outcomes, and often does worse. In the cooperation scenario in particular, Nietzschean altruism never manages to implement the cooperative outcome. Under perfect discrimination, moreover, inequality averse (Rawlsian) altruism often evolves at the expense of selfishness. These results suggest that the development of sophisticated discrimination abilities may be strongly adaptive in supporting fairness-oriented forms of pro-sociality in humans in the context of social dilemmas and coordination problems.
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(2016): Social norms, costly punishment and the evolution of cooperation. In: Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination 11 (2), S. 313-343. DOI: 10.1007/s11403-015-0146-8
Abstract: Both laboratory and field evidence suggest that people tend to voluntarily incur costs to punish non-cooperators. While costly punishment typically reduces the average payoff as well as promotes cooperation. Why does the costly punishment evolve? We study the role of punishment in cooperation promotion within a two-level evolution framework of individual strategies and social norms. In a population with certain social norm, players update their strategies according to the payoff differences among different strategies. In a longer horizon, the evolution of social norm may be driven by the average payoffs of of all members of the society. Norms differ in whether they allow or do not allow for the punishment action as part of strategies, and, for the former, they further differ in whether they encourage or do not encourage the punishment action. The strategy dynamics are articulated under different social norms. It is found that costly punishment does contribute to the evolution toward cooperation. Not only does the attraction basin of cooperative evolutionary stable state (CESS) become larger, but also the convergence speed to CESS is faster. These two properties are further enhanced if the punishment action is encouraged by the social norm. This model can be used to explain the widespread existence of costly punishment in human society.
Keywords: Bestrafung, Disziplin, economics, Favoriten, Genese von Normen, Good manners, Kooperation, Modelle/Theorien, Natur & Genese von Normen, Normen, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Ökonomische Theorie sozialer Normen, Soziale Angemessenheit, Soziale Normen, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten, Wandel von Normen -
(2016): Let justice be done. A performative view on Portuguese criminal trial procedures. In: Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies 13 (4), S. 400-415. DOI: 10.1080/14791420.2016.1160137
Abstract: Based on fieldwork at criminal courts in the metropolitan area of Lisbon, the article examines the performativity of criminal justice. The written and unwritten rules of criminal trial procedures are analysed as judicial scripts that guide the “making” of Justice. The formalities of the criminal trial, like those that prescribe the correct behaviour of defendants in Portuguese courts, are tied to the liminality of their social standing and their betwixt-and-between position in the court and in society. Script compliance is discussed as a central element within the production of criminal justice. Finally, the article suggests a performative view of justice, drawing on Butler's ideas regarding the enactment and construction of notions of gender.
Keywords: Beeinflussung der Bewertung moralischer Urteile, Bewertung von sozialem Verhalten (/sozialer Angemessenheit), Body, criminal justice, criminal proceedings, Erwartungen, Kooperation, legal anthropology, performance, Portugal, Rechtswissenschaft, Rollen, script, script compliance, Situationsbedingter Kontext, Soziale Hierarchie, Soziale Klasse / Schicht, Sozialer Raum / Kultureller Kontext 2015
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(2015): (Un)expected behavior. Some general issues and a papal example. In: Journal of Pragmatics 86, S. 19-24. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2015.06.008
Abstract: The definitional debate as to which concept - politeness or appropriateness - it to be chosen as the superordinate one is far from over in politeness studies. In this paper I will raise the question of whether unexpectedness could be a candidate as the encompassing category. I will also tackle two related issues: that of unexpected behavior as a marked choice in a given context, and that of the relevance of the emotive aspects of interaction to the construction of the context. To this end, I will advance the hypothesis that the following notions can together help understand interaction functioning: (a) the interplay/co-variance among different interactional parameters (Caffi, 2001, 2007), (b) the divergence of different kinds of expectations from anticipatory schemata (Caffi and Janney, 1994), and (c) the notion of interactional temperature (an extension of Watzlawick et al.'s, 1967 thermostat metaphor). After some preliminary remarks meant to illustrate the above-mentioned points, I will discuss an example of unexpected behavior, Pope Francis's first greeting after his election. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
2014
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(2014): Minds as social institutions. In: Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 13 (1), S. 121-143. DOI: 10.1007/s11097-013-9324-0
Abstract: I will first discuss how social interactions organize, coordinate, and specialize as "artifacts," tools; how these tools are not only for coordination but for achieving something, for some outcome (goal/function), for a collective work. In particular, I will argue that these artifacts specify (predict and prescribe) the mental contents of the participants, both in terms of beliefs and acceptances and in terms of motives and plans. We have to revise the behavioristic view of "scripts" and "roles"; when we play a role we wear a "mind." No collective action would be possible without shared and/or ascribed mental contents. This is also very crucial for a central form of automatic mind-reading (mind ascription). Second, I will argue that often what really matters is the ascribed/prescribed, worn, mind not the real, private one. We have to play (like in the symbolic play) "as if" we had those mental contents. This social convention and mutual assumption makes the interaction work. The ascribed beliefs and goals are not necessarily explicitly there; they might be just implicit as inactive (we act just by routine and automatically) or implicit as potential. The coordination and social action works thanks to these "as if" (ascribed and pretended) minds, thanks to those conventional constructs. Our social minds for social interactions are coordination artifacts and social institutions.
Keywords: als ob, belief in beliefs, Coordination, coordination artifacts, Extended mind, Interaktion, Kooperation, Kognitionswissenschaft/Social Sciences/Humanities, Konventionen, philosophy of mind, script, Social frames, Social institutions, social interaction, soziale Kognition, theory of mind, Überzeugungen, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten -
(2014): Subclinical Bias, Manners, and Moral Harm. In: Hypatia 29 (2), S. 287-302. DOI: 10.1111/hypa.12026
Abstract: Mundane and often subtle forms of bias generate harms that can be fruitfully understood as akin to the harms evident in rudeness. Although subclinical expressions of bias are not mere rudeness, like rudeness they often manifest through the breach of mannerly norms for social cooperation and collaboration. At a basic level, the perceived harm of mundane forms of bias often has much to do with feeling oneself unjustly or arbitrarily cut out of a group, a group that cooperates and collaborates but does not do so with me. Appealing to the subtle but familiar choreography of mannered social interaction, I argue, makes it easier to recognize how exclusion can be accomplished through slight but symbolically significant gestures and styles of interaction, where bias manifests not in announced hostility but in an absence of the cooperation and collaboration upon which we rely socially.
2013
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(2013): Being and feeling in sync with an adaptive virtual partner. Brain mechanisms underlying dynamic cooperativity. In: Cerebral cortex (New York, N.Y. : 1991) 23 (11), S. 2592-2600. DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhs243
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22892422 Abstract: Cooperation is intrinsic to the human ability to work together toward common goals, and depends on sensing and reacting to dynamically changing relationships between coacting partners. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and a paradigm in which an adaptive pacing signal simulates a virtual partner, we examined the neural substrates underlying dynamic joint action. A single parameter controlled the degree to which the virtual partner adapted its behavior in relation to participant taps, thus simulating varying degrees of cooperativity. Analyses of fMRI data using objective and subjective measures of synchronization quality found the relative balance of activity in two distinct neural networks to depend on the degree of the virtual partner's adaptivity. At lower degrees of adaptivity, when the virtual partner was easier to synchronize with, cortical midline structures were activated in conjunction with premotor areas, suggesting a link between the action and socio-affective components of cooperation. By contrast, right lateral prefrontal areas associated with central executive control processes were recruited during more cognitively challenging interactions while synchronizing with an overly adaptive virtual partner. Together, the reduced adaptive sensorimotor synchronization paradigm and pattern of results illuminate neural mechanisms that may underlie the socio-emotional consequences of different degrees of entrainment success.
Keywords: Acoustic Stimulation, adaptation, Adult, Anpassung, BRAIN, Brain Mapping, Cooperative Behavior, Emotions, Female, Gehirnfunktion, Humans, Kognitionswissenschaft/Social Sciences/Humanities, Kognitive Skills/Social Cognition, Kooperation, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Photic Stimulation, physiology, Psychological, Sensory Feedback, User-Computer Interface, Young Adult -
(2013): Design of social agents. In: Neurocomputing 114, S. 92-97. DOI: 10.1016/j.neucom.2012.06.046
Abstract: Social behavior, as compared to the egoistic behavior, is known to be more beneficial to groups of subjects and even to individual members of a group. For this reason, social norms naturally emerge as a product of evolution in human and animal populations. The benefit of the social behavior makes it also an interesting subject in the field of artificial agents. Social interactions implemented in computer agents can improve their personal and group performance. In this study we formulate design principles of social agents and use them to create social computer agents. To construct social agents we take two approaches. First, we construct a social computer agent based on our understanding of social behavior. Second, we use an evolutionary approach to create a social agent. The social agents are shown to outperform agents that do not utilize social behavior.
Keywords: Constructing social computer based on social behaviour, Design, Disziplin, Ethologie (Verhaltensforschung), Favoriten, Ingenieurswissenschaft, Kooperation, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Modelle/Theorien, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Realtechnik, Sozial Intelligente Agenten, Soziale Robotik, Technik, Volltreffer, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten -
(2013): Toward an Understanding of Culture and the Performance of Teams in Complex Systems. In: IEEE Systems Journal 7 (4), S. 606-615. DOI: 10.1109/JSYST.2012.2206153
Abstract: Systems are becoming ever more complex and the practice of systems engineering is becoming more formalized. However, this formalization is aimed primarily at the technical and process components of complex systems and systems of systems. National cultural variations in the human components of such systems (typically functioning as groups or teams) are not typically included in the formal specifications and, as a result, the technical end products do not fully compensate for these variations. This paper provides an introduction to culture, its sources, its measurement, and its effects on team performance. It presents a summary of the research literature on culture and teams, and an overview of a set of pilot studies carried out by the authors. It then describes a methodology and software tool developed by the authors for the assessment of the cultural traits of team members and the estimation of the effects of team member culture on team performance. This paper concludes that despite some disparities in the results of research studies, sufficiently strong relationships between culture and team performance have been established to justify the development of culture-sensitive team performance prediction tools.
2012
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(2012): Solidarity and Social Moral Rules. In: Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 15 (5), S. 691-706. DOI: 10.1007/s10677-011-9313-8
Abstract: The value of solidarity, which is exemplified in noble groups like the Civil Rights Movement along with more mundane teams, families and marriages, is distinctive in part because people are in solidarity over, for or with regard to something, such as common sympathies, interests, values, etc. I use this special feature of solidarity to resolve a longstanding puzzle about enacted social moral rules, which is, aren't these things just heuristics, rules of thumb or means of coordination that we 'fetishize' or 'worship' if we stubbornly insist on sticking to them when we can do more good by breaking them? I argue that when we are in a certain kind of solidarity with others, united by social moral rules that we have established among ourselves, the rules we have developed and maintain are a constitutive part of our solidary relationships with one another; and it is part of being in this sort of solidarity with our comrades that we are presumptively required to follow the social moral rules that join us together. Those in the Polish Revolution, for example, were bound by informally enforced rules about publicity, free speech and the use of violence, so following their own rules became a way of standing in a valuable sort of solidarity with one another. I explain why we can have non-instrumental reasons to follow the social moral rules that exist in our own society, improve our rules and even sometimes to break the otherwise good rules that help to unite us.
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(2012): Decision making and equilibria. In: Synthese 187 (1), S. 293-304. DOI: 10.1007/s11229-011-0029-z
Abstract: In economics and in the social sciences, the study of decision making of the single individual is an important preliminary step to provide a sound foundation for the analysis of equilibria in economic and social systems. Neuroeconomic analysis of the process has been a recent fruitful development in this direction. In the more recent past a new direction of research has emerged, studying the interplay of the decision making of the single individual with the economic and social environment that surrounds him. We review some of the results in this field, both theoretical and experimental, and suggest that a closer development of these two methods of research will be necessary in the future.
2011
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(2011): The ghosts in the computer. The role of agency and animacy attributions in "ghost controls". In: PLoS one 6 (11). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0026429
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22073165 Abstract: Three studies evaluated the role of 4-year-old children's agency- and animacy-attributions when learning from a computerized ghost control (GC). In GCs, participants observe events occurring without an apparent agent, as if executed by a "ghost" or unobserved causal forces. Using a touch-screen, children in Experiment 1 responded to three pictures in a specific order under three learning conditions: (i) trial-and-error (Baseline), (ii) imitation and (iii) Ghost Control. Before testing in the GC, children were read one of three scripts that determined agency attributions. Post-test assessments confirmed that all children attributed agency to the computer and learned in all GCs. In Experiment 2, children were not trained on the computer prior to testing, and no scripts were used. Three different GCs, varying in number of agency cues, were used. Children failed to learn in these GCs, yet attributed agency and animacy to the computer. Experiment 3 evaluated whether children could learn from a human model in the absence of training under conditions where the information presented by the model and the computer was either consistent or inconsistent. Children evidenced learning in both of these conditions. Overall, learning in social conditions (Exp. 3) was significantly better than learning in GCs (Exp. 2). These results, together with other published research, suggest that children privilege social over non-social sources of information and are generally more adept at learning novel tasks from a human than from a computer or GC.
2010
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(2010): Culture and cooperation. In: Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences 365 (1553), S. 2651-2661. DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2010.0135
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20679109 Abstract: Does the cultural background influence the success with which genetically unrelated individuals cooperate in social dilemma situations? In this paper, we provide an answer by analysing the data of Herrmann et al. (2008a), who studied cooperation and punishment in 16 subject pools from six different world cultures (as classified by Inglehart & Baker (2000)). We use analysis of variance to disentangle the importance of cultural background relative to individual heterogeneity and group-level differences in cooperation. We find that culture has a substantial influence on the extent of cooperation, in addition to individual heterogeneity and group-level differences identified by previous research. The significance of this result is that cultural background has a substantial influence on cooperation in otherwise identical environments. This is particularly true in the presence of punishment opportunities.
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(2010): Mobilizing Response. In: Research on Language & Social Interaction 43 (1), S. 3-31. DOI: 10.1080/08351810903471258
Abstract: A fundamental puzzle in the organization of social interaction concerns how one individual elicits a response from another. This article asks what it is about some sequentially initial turns that reliably mobilizes a coparticipant to respond and under what circumstances individuals are accountable for producing a response. Whereas a linguistic approach suggests that this is what oquestionso (more generally) and interrogativity (more narrowly) are for, a sociological approach to social interaction suggests that the social action a person is implementing mobilizes a recipient's response. We find that although both theories have merit, neither adequately solves the puzzle. We argue instead that different actions mobilize response to different degrees. Speakers then design their turns to perform actions, and with particular response-mobilizing features of turn-design speakers can hold recipients more accountable for responding or not. This model of response relevance allows sequential position, action, and turn design to each contribute to response relevance.
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(2010): Virtual Communities. In: Techné: Research in Philosophy and Technology 14 (3), S. 237-251. DOI: 10.5840/techne201014324
Abstract: The Internet, as it exists today, is an outgrowth of the late 1960’s Advanced Research Projects Agency Network. During the 1980’s, the National Science Foundation established a high-speed, high-capacity network called NSFnet connecting many universities and government agencies. Finally, with the creation of the World Wide Web and the development and diffusion of inexpensive, reliable and easy to use public Internet access, electronic information technologies connect an increasingly large portion of the population. As a result, the communities with which we are all familiar, communities based on geographic proximity, have changed. These sorts of changes raise many interesting but difficult questions. This paper focuses on two of those questions. First, what does the increasing use of and reliance on electronically mediated communications portend for our understanding of human communities, and second, what sorts of socio-political concepts and relationships best characterize the new “virtual community”?
Keywords: Art des Kommunikationsmediums, community, Disziplin, elektronische Kommunikation, Gemeinschaft, Informations- & Kommunikationstechnik, Interaktion, Kommunikation, Kooperation, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Philosophie, Realtechnik, Situationsbedingter Kontext, Soziale Angemessenheit, Technik, Technikphilosophie, Virtual Life, Zeitschrift: techne