The Roots of Human Sociality: An Ethno-Experimental Exploration of the Foundations of Economic Norms in 16 Small-Scale Societies

在所有的人类社会中，各种各样的社会现象都是由自我调节的机构或一套规范来管理的，这些规范规定了适当的行为和对不适当行为的适当制裁。 这些规范影响着范围广泛的人类活动，从婚姻模式和性别不平等到政治进程和市场交换。尽管相当多的人同意这种制度的存在，但现存的理论很难解释亲社会规范的起源和维持（例如，公平的标准，或惩罚违反规范者的规则），构成了社会互动的基石。 来自社会科学的实验和实地数据都表明，无论是狭隘的经济利己主义假设，还是基于亲属关系或互惠的进化模型，都不足以解释人类亲社会性的观察模式。为了探索人类社会规范和偏好的多样性，麦克阿瑟基金会于1998年邀请了12位经验丰富的实地人类学家，在小规模社会中率先使用实验经济学方法。在研究的第二阶段，研究人员将通过实验测量个人对利他主义（或公平）的偏好/品味，直接惩罚（惩罚违反规范者的意愿）和第三方惩罚（第三方观察者愿意付出代价来惩罚不公平）来探索社会规范的基础。 这些实地地点包括世界上大多数大陆的采集者、刀耕火种的园艺家、游牧民族、小规模农业者和城市雇佣劳动者。 在这些背景下进行实验的优势之一是，受试者的社会范围比通常在美国大学实验室中发现的要广。 这项新研究的总体目标是复制早期的工作（包括利他行为随着市场整合程度的增加而增加的发现），通过包括九个新网站和新实验来扩大研究，加强跨网站的数据收集方法，并通过新的可测试预测来扩展研究。三个游戏的核心包（独裁者，最后通牒与战略方法，第三方惩罚游戏）将在所有16个现场使用。 此外，小组的子集将进行四项补充研究，以检查：1）社交网络和信任之间的关系，2）通过操纵游戏在当地文化中的呈现而产生的框架效应，3）实验者对受试者在双盲游戏中的决策的知识的影响，以及4）游戏行为的时间的、个体内的可复制性，即，如果对相同的受试者重复相同的游戏，偏好是否会改变？一个庞大而多样化的研究群体的优势之一是各种各样的理论传统和利益。该小组包括在进化理论，心理人类学，理性选择，新制度经济学，发展和网络分析等领域进行了主要理论和实证工作的学者。 以往的经验表明，这种理论的多样性激发了新的想法，创新的实证工作，并通过挑战，从范式的冲突产生的理论发展。 这个项目应该有助于理论工作，探索社会学习，制度，文化进化和文化基因共同进化对人类行为的重要性。

0136761Ensminger & HenrichIn all human societies, a wide range of social phenomena are governed by self-regulating institutions, or sets of norms that prescribe appropriate behaviors and proper sanctions for inappropriate behavior. Such norms influence an enormous range of human activity, from marriage patterns and sexual inequality to political processes and market exchange. Despite a fair amount of agreement that such institutions exist, extant theories struggle to explain the genesis and maintenance of pro-social norms (e.g., standards of fairness, or rules for punishing norm violators) that form the bedrock of social interaction. Both experimental and field data from across the social sciences indicate that neither assumptions of narrow economic self-interest nor evolutionary models based on kinship or reciprocity are sufficient to account for the observed patterns of human pro-sociality. To probe the diversity of social norms and preferences across the human spectrum, in 1998 the MacArthur Foundation invited twelve experienced field anthropologists to pioneer the use of experimental economic methods in small-scale societies. In this second phase of research, the researchers will explore the foundations of social norms by experimentally measuring individuals' preferences/tastes for altruism (or fairness), direct punishment (willingness to punish norm violators), and third party punishment (willingness of third-party observers to pay a price to punish unfairness) across 16 small-scale societies. These field sites include foragers, slash and burn horticulturalists, pastoral-nomads, small-scale agriculturalists, and urban wage laborers on most continents of the world. One of the advantages of running experiments in these contexts is that the social spectrum of subjects is broadened from those typically found in U.S. university laboratories. The overall objectives of this new research are to replicate the earlier work (including the finding that altruistic behavior increases with the level of market integration), to broaden the research by including nine new sites and new experiments, to tighten the data collection methods across sites, and to extend the research with new testable predictions. A core package of three games (the Dictator, Ultimatum with Strategy Method, and Third-Party Punishment Games) will be used at all 16 field sites. In addition, subsets of the group will pursue four supplemental studies to examine: 1) the relationship between social networks and trust, 2) framing effects created by manipulating the presentation of the games in the local culture, 3) the effect of the experimenter's knowledge of subjects' decisions in double-blind games, and 4) the temporal, intra-individual replicability of game behavior, i.e. if the same game is repeated with the same subjects, do preferences change? One of the advantages of a large and diverse group of researchers is the variety of theoretical traditions and interests brought to the table. The group contains scholars who have done their major theoretical and empirical work in the fields of evolutionary theory, psychological anthropology, rational choice, new institutional economics, development, and network analysis. Previous experience has shown that this theoretical diversity inspires novel ideas, innovative empirical work, and theoretical development through the challenges that arise from the clash of paradigms. This project should contribute to theoretical work that explores the importance of social learning, institutions, cultural evolution, and culture-gene co-evolution on human behavior.