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In medio stat virtus: Theoretical and methodological extremes regarding reciprocity will not explain complex social behaviors

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2012

Claudia Civai  and
Alan Langus
Claudia Civai
Affiliation:
SISSA/ISAS–International School for Advanced Studies, via Bonomea, 265, 34136 Trieste, Italy. [email protected]://www.sissa.it/cns/[email protected]
Alan Langus
Affiliation:
SISSA/ISAS–International School for Advanced Studies, via Bonomea, 265, 34136 Trieste, Italy. [email protected]://www.sissa.it/cns/[email protected]
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Abstract

Guala contests the validity of strong reciprocity as a key element in shaping social behavior by contrasting evidence from experimental games to that of natural and historic data. He suggests that in order to understand the evolution of social behavior researchers should focus on natural data and weak reciprocity. We disagree with Guala's proposal to shift the focus of the study from one extreme of the spectrum (strong reciprocity) to the other extreme (weak reciprocity). We argue that the study of the evolution of social behavior must be comparative in nature, and we point out experimental evidence that shows that social behavior is not cooperation determined by a set of fixed factors. We argue for a model that sees social behavior as a dynamic interaction of genetic and environmental factors.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , February 2012 , pp. 22 - 23
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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