Coalitions, Dominance and Egalitarianism

联盟、统治和平等主义

• 批准号: 0421827
• 负责人: Mike Mesterton-Gibbons
• 金额: $ 8.83万
• 依托单位: Florida State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2004
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2004-09-01 至 2008-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0421827&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Coalitions; Dominance; Egalitarianism

Cooperation and dominance are central to the study of animalsocial relations, a remarkable feature of which is the emergenceand persistence of linear dominance hierarchies or "peckingorders." For well over half a century, the conventionaltheoretical approach to cooperation and dominance has been tostudy them separately. But this approach ultimately yieldsdiminishing returns, because each phenomenon incorporates crucialaspects of the other. On the one hand, a dominance hierarchy is acooperative structure: well organized groups, in which eachindividual knows and is fairly resigned to its particular socialstatus, are more productive than similar groups in a constantstate of organizational turmoil. On the other hand, there areindividual benefits to holding high rank within a dominancehierarchy, and animals can help themselves obtain those benefitsby forming coalitions with others. The investigator studies theseconnections between cooperation and dominance by developing asuite of analytical and computational models to predict theeffects of coalition formation on the emergence and stability ofdominance hierarchies versus more egalitarian social structures,and to identify conditions that favor each possible outcome. Themodels are "games," i.e., mathematical models of strategicinteraction. There is no formal theory to predict the effects ofcoalitions and domoinance hierarchies on each other, yet suchtheory is urgently needed to guide and interpret field studies inthe biological and social sciences. The development of such aformal theory also leads to advances in game-theoretic techniques. Moreover, because there are good reasons to suppose thatmechanisms for social stability are broadly similar acrossdifferent kinds of groups, the project has likely implications forconflict resolution among humans. In particular, the results ofthe project should help to resolve an ongoing controversy inanthropology between those who argue that egalitarian societiesare deliberately shaped by their members, with the political rankand file creating a "reverse dominance hierarchy," and those whostress that levelling mechanisms operate independently of people'sintentions. Finally, a central goal is to develop an online gametheory workshop for students in the life and social sciences. Allmaterials developed during the project -- in particular, numerousgame-theoretic computer programs -- are made freely availablethrough this web site. It therefore serves as a permanent legacy,with the potential to strengthen the modelling skills of everystudent of game theory.

合作和优势是动物社会关系研究的核心，其显著特征是线性优势等级或“啄食顺序”的出现和持续。“半个多世纪以来，传统的理论方法对合作和统治一直是研究他们分开。 但这种方法最终会产生收益递减，因为每种现象都包含了另一种现象的关键方面。 一方面，统治等级是一种合作结构：组织良好的群体，其中每个人都知道并相当顺从其特定的社会地位，比处于组织混乱状态的类似群体更有生产力。 另一方面，在统治等级制度中保持较高的地位对个体也有好处，动物可以通过与其他动物结盟来帮助自己获得这些好处。 研究者通过开发一套分析和计算模型来研究合作与优势之间的联系，以预测联盟形成对优势等级制的出现和稳定性的影响，以及对更平等的社会结构的影响，并确定有利于每种可能结果的条件。 Themodels是“游戏”，即，战略互动的数学模型。 目前还没有正式的理论来预测联盟和统治等级制度对彼此的影响，但迫切需要这样的理论来指导和解释生物和社会科学领域的研究。 这种非形式理论的发展也导致了博弈论技术的进步。此外，由于有充分的理由假设社会稳定的机制在不同类型的群体中大致相似，该项目可能对人类之间的冲突解决产生影响。 特别是，该项目的结果应该有助于解决人类学中正在进行的一场争论，一方认为平等主义社会是由其成员故意塑造的，政治等级和档案创造了一个“反向统治等级”，另一方则强调平等机制的运作独立于人们的意图。 最后，一个中心目标是为生命科学和社会科学的学生开发一个在线游戏理论研讨会。 在这个项目中开发的所有材料--特别是大量的博弈论计算机程序--都可以通过这个网站免费获得。 因此，它是一个永久的遗产，有可能加强每个博弈论学生的建模技能。