ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2022
Cooperation as a signal of time preferences.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed.
- Why human societies adopt rigid moral rules: The efficiency-robustness trade-off.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- The role of future planning, patience, and risk tolerance for prospective reciprocity in human adults.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Partner choice increases observed reciprocity-based cooperation but decreases unobserved stake-based cooperation.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- The social leverage effect: Institutions transform weak reputation effects into strong incentives for cooperation.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Punishment is slower than cooperation or defection in online network games.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Evolution of conditional cooperation in collective-risk social dilemma with repeated group interactions.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2023Article
- Cooperation as a signal of time preferences.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
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Abstract
Many evolutionary models explain why we cooperate with non-kin, but few explain why cooperative behaviour and trust vary. Here, we introduce a model of cooperation as a signal of time preferences, which addresses this variability. At equilibrium in our model (i) future-oriented individuals are more motivated to cooperate, (ii) future-oriented populations have access to a wider range of cooperative opportunities, and (iii) spontaneous and inconspicuous cooperation reveal stronger preference for the future, and therefore inspire more trust. Our theory sheds light on the variability of cooperative behaviour and trust. Since affluence tends to align with time preferences, results (i) and (ii) explain why cooperation is often associated with affluence, in surveys and field studies. Time preferences also explain why we trust others based on proxies for impulsivity, and, following result (iii), why uncalculating, subtle and one-shot cooperators are deemed particularly trustworthy. Time preferences provide a powerful and parsimonious explanatory lens, through which we can better understand the variability of trust and cooperation.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.