Evolutionary dynamics of nonlinear public goods games with fluctuating demography

Research Project
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01.04.2012
- 31.03.2013

Many situations in real social systems require the collective action of groups of more than two individuals. Public goods games, where individuals face the dilemma of providing or maintaining a public good, are paradigmatic among such multiplayer games. Digestive enzymes in yeast, ATP in heterotrophic microorganisms, alarm calls in meerkats, collective hunting in lions, and open-source software in contemporary humans are typical examples of public goods whose abusive exploitation by non-contributing individuals may lead to the so-called tragedy of the commons: a situation in which as nobody contributes no public good is produced or maintained. Despite the fact that non-linearity and stochasticity are common in nature, most models of evolutionary public goods games assume that the production function is linear and that demographic parameters such as group size are constant. By combining evolutionary game theory and inclusive fitness theory, this project aims at developing a mathematical framework for analyzing the evolutionary dynamics of non-linear public goods games in structured populations with fluctuating demography. Our goal is to identify key demographic and strategic conditions under which cooperation is promoted with respect to baseline scenarios.

Collaborations & Cooperations

2015 - Participation or Organization of Collaborations on a national level

Lehmann, Laurent, Professor, Universität Lausanne, Research cooperation

Publications

Peña, Jorge (2012) ‘Group-size diversity in public goods games’, Evolution, 66(3), pp. 623–36. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1558-5646.2011.01504.x.

URLs

Members (2)

Georg Nöldeke

Principal Investigator

Jorge Alejandro Pena Suarez

Co-Investigator

Research Groups

Microeconomic Theory (Nöldeke)