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Jillian J. Jordan

Other affiliations: Yale University, Harvard University
Bio: Jillian J. Jordan is an academic researcher from Northwestern University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Third-party punishment & Selfishness. The author has an hindex of 17, co-authored 28 publications receiving 2775 citations. Previous affiliations of Jillian J. Jordan include Yale University & Harvard University.

Papers
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors review experimental and theoretical research that advances our understanding of human cooperation, focusing on spatial pattern formation, on the spatiotemporal dynamics of observed solutions, and on self-organization that may either promote or hinder socially favorable states.

984 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Experimental and theoretical research is reviewed that advances the understanding of human cooperation, focusing on spatial pattern formation, on the spatiotemporal dynamics of observed solutions, and on self-organization that may either promote or hinder socially favorable states.
Abstract: Extensive cooperation among unrelated individuals is unique to humans, who often sacrifice personal benefits for the common good and work together to achieve what they are unable to execute alone. The evolutionary success of our species is indeed due, to a large degree, to our unparalleled other-regarding abilities. Yet, a comprehensive understanding of human cooperation remains a formidable challenge. Recent research in social science indicates that it is important to focus on the collective behavior that emerges as the result of the interactions among individuals, groups, and even societies. Non-equilibrium statistical physics, in particular Monte Carlo methods and the theory of collective behavior of interacting particles near phase transition points, has proven to be very valuable for understanding counterintuitive evolutionary outcomes. By studying models of human cooperation as classical spin models, a physicist can draw on familiar settings from statistical physics. However, unlike pairwise interactions among particles that typically govern solid-state physics systems, interactions among humans often involve group interactions, and they also involve a larger number of possible states even for the most simplified description of reality. The complexity of solutions therefore often surpasses that observed in physical systems. Here we review experimental and theoretical research that advances our understanding of human cooperation, focusing on spatial pattern formation, on the spatiotemporal dynamics of observed solutions, and on self-organization that may either promote or hinder socially favorable states.

799 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
25 Feb 2016-Nature
TL;DR: It is shown that TPP is indeed a signal of trustworthiness: third-party punishers are trusted more, and actually behave in a more trustworthy way, than non-punishers, and introducing a more informative signal—the opportunity to help directly—attenuates these signalling effects.
Abstract: Third-party punishment (TPP), in which unaffected observers punish selfishness, promotes cooperation by deterring defection. But why should individuals choose to bear the costs of punishing? We present a game theoretic model of TPP as a costly signal of trustworthiness. Our model is based on individual differences in the costs and/or benefits of being trustworthy. We argue that individuals for whom trustworthiness is payoff-maximizing will find TPP to be less net costly (for example, because mechanisms that incentivize some individuals to be trustworthy also create benefits for deterring selfishness via TPP). We show that because of this relationship, it can be advantageous for individuals to punish selfishness in order to signal that they are not selfish themselves. We then empirically validate our model using economic game experiments. We show that TPP is indeed a signal of trustworthiness: third-party punishers are trusted more, and actually behave in a more trustworthy way, than non-punishers. Furthermore, as predicted by our model, introducing a more informative signal--the opportunity to help directly--attenuates these signalling effects. When potential punishers have the chance to help, they are less likely to punish, and punishment is perceived as, and actually is, a weaker signal of trustworthiness. Costly helping, in contrast, is a strong and highly used signal even when TPP is also possible. Together, our model and experiments provide a formal reputational account of TPP, and demonstrate how the costs of punishing may be recouped by the long-run benefits of signalling one's trustworthiness.

299 citations

Posted Content
TL;DR: The Social Heuristics Hypothesis as discussed by the authors argues that when individuals learn that cooperative strategies are generally advantageous, they become internalized as intuitive defaults. And these defaults can spill over to produce "irrational" cooperative behavior even when externally imposed incentives are absent.
Abstract: A key element of human morality is prosocial behavior. Humans are unique among animals in their willingness to pay costs to benefit unrelated friends and strangers. This cooperation is a critical part of our identity as moral beings. Here, we ask why humans cooperate, and what can explain variation in cooperative behavior across social groups, individuals, and situations. We begin by defining cooperation, and discussing economic games as laboratory models for studying cooperative behavior. Next we provide an overview of several mechanisms that can make cooperation advantageous in the long run: direct reciprocity, indirect reciprocity, and institutions. We then turn to cooperative behavior that occurs beyond the reach of such mechanisms and thus is truly costly. We discuss the Social Heuristics Hypothesis, which contends that when individuals learn that cooperative strategies are generally advantageous, they become internalized as intuitive defaults. These defaults can spill over to produce “irrational” cooperative behavior even when externally imposed incentives are absent. Thus, we suggest that daily experience plays an important role in shaping culturally varying conceptions of cooperation as a virtuous behavior. Finally, we close by discussing open questions for future research on cooperation.

279 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Investigating costly third-party punishment in 5- and 6-year-old children shows that from early in development children show a sophisticated capacity to promote fair behavior, and shows that 6- year-olds were willing to sacrifice resources to intervene against unfairness.

171 citations


Cited by
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Journal Article
TL;DR: Prospect Theory led cognitive psychology in a new direction that began to uncover other human biases in thinking that are probably not learned but are part of the authors' brain’s wiring.
Abstract: In 1974 an article appeared in Science magazine with the dry-sounding title “Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases” by a pair of psychologists who were not well known outside their discipline of decision theory. In it Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman introduced the world to Prospect Theory, which mapped out how humans actually behave when faced with decisions about gains and losses, in contrast to how economists assumed that people behave. Prospect Theory turned Economics on its head by demonstrating through a series of ingenious experiments that people are much more concerned with losses than they are with gains, and that framing a choice from one perspective or the other will result in decisions that are exactly the opposite of each other, even if the outcomes are monetarily the same. Prospect Theory led cognitive psychology in a new direction that began to uncover other human biases in thinking that are probably not learned but are part of our brain’s wiring.

4,351 citations

01 Jan 2012

3,692 citations

Journal ArticleDOI

3,628 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Evidence from neuroimaging, psychophysiological studies, and related fields are reviewed to argue for the development of a second-person neuroscience, which will help neuroscience to really “go social” and may also be relevant for the understanding of psychiatric disorders construed as disorders of social cognition.
Abstract: In spite of the remarkable progress made in the burgeoning field of social neuroscience, the neural mechanisms that underlie social encounters are only beginning to be studied and could-paradoxically-be seen as representing the "dark matter" of social neuroscience. Recent conceptual and empirical developments consistently indicate the need for investigations that allow the study of real-time social encounters in a truly interactive manner. This suggestion is based on the premise that social cognition is fundamentally different when we are in interaction with others rather than merely observing them. In this article, we outline the theoretical conception of a second-person approach to other minds and review evidence from neuroimaging, psychophysiological studies, and related fields to argue for the development of a second-person neuroscience, which will help neuroscience to really "go social"; this may also be relevant for our understanding of psychiatric disorders construed as disorders of social cognition.

1,022 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors review experimental and theoretical research that advances our understanding of human cooperation, focusing on spatial pattern formation, on the spatiotemporal dynamics of observed solutions, and on self-organization that may either promote or hinder socially favorable states.

984 citations