Week 3- Human Adaptations For Reciprocal Altruism Flashcards
Trivers’ and emotions
Trivers recognised that many of our emotions can be understood as ways to encourage reciprocity and the benefits or mutual altruism
What do emotions such as gratitude, shame, and a sense of justice help us commit
Commits us to the benefits of long-term co-operation over the short-term gains from deceit and defection
What does Trivers say these moral emotions make us do
These ‘moral emotions’ bias is to repay our debts and cooperate with others, and to both reward others who cooperate and punish those who defect
Haidt 2003- different kinds of moral emotions
Condemning others- punish and discourage defection in others- anger, disgust, spite, outrage
The ultimatum game
This game requires two players: a proposer and a responder
The proposer is given a pot of money and must make an offer about how to split this money between themselves and the responder
The responder then decides whether to accept or reject the offer
If the responder accepts, then the money is split as proposed by the two players. But if the offer is rejected, neither player receives any of the money
What does the ultimatum game demonstrate
People are willing to behave with spite, that is, punish behaviour that is perceived to be unfair m, even at a cost to themselves
Why are spiteful acts important for maintaining cooperativeness in a group
The threat of punishment increases cooperation within a group, even when the cost of punishment is sometimes so high it reduces the overall success of the group
Moral emotions and where they are in the brain
We might expect these moral emotions to be heavily dependent on more recently evolved cortex.
Regions of prefrontal cortex seem to play an important role in emotions related to affiliation
How Is a cortical basis for moral emotion systems consistent
It is also consistent with the rapid develop development of the cortex in humans, and with their complex and large social networks
What do regions of the prefrontal cortex play an important role in
Emotions related to affiliation
This may be consistent with other accounts of psychopathy
Psychopaths
They’re capable of destructive behaviour even when they seem able to identify the moral transgressions involved, and even when able to identify the moral transgressions
What did cosmides argue about Brian systems
People have specialised brain systems for cheat detection
- she investigated the hypotheses using the wason task, a test of what’s called conditional reasoning
Cosmides and her thoughts on cheaters
A cheater is someone who violates the rules of social exchange, by taking the benefit, but not paying the cost
Cheat detection processes are meant to bias people to consider two things:
- if someone took the benefit, did they pay the cost?
- if someone has not paid the cost, have they taken the benefit?
Do people hold an image of themselves that are more effective and beneficial than reality
People in general hold an image of themselves that’s is more effective and beneficial than reality
For example,
People often rate their own contribution to a successful group activity as more significant than do the other members of the group
In general, people are often bad at articulating why they make the choices they do
