%0 Journal Article
%T Emergence and suppression of cooperation by action visibility in transparent games
%A Alexander Gail
%A Anton M. Unakafov
%A Fred Wolf
%A Igor Kagan
%A Sebastian Moeller
%A Stephan Eule
%A Thomas Schultze
%J -
%D 2020
%R 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007588
%X Real-world agents, humans as well as animals, observe each other during interactions and choose their own actions taking the partners¡¯ ongoing behaviour into account. Yet, classical game theory assumes that players act either strictly sequentially or strictly simultaneously without knowing each other¡¯s current choices. To account for action visibility and provide a more realistic model of interactions under time constraints, we introduce a new game-theoretic setting called transparent games, where each player has a certain probability of observing the partner¡¯s choice before deciding on its own action. By means of evolutionary simulations, we demonstrate that even a small probability of seeing the partner¡¯s choice before one¡¯s own decision substantially changes the evolutionary successful strategies. Action visibility enhances cooperation in an iterated coordination game, but reduces cooperation in a more competitive iterated Prisoner¡¯s Dilemma. In both games, ¡°Win¨Cstay, lose¨Cshift¡± and ¡°Tit-for-tat¡± strategies are predominant for moderate transparency, while a ¡°Leader-Follower¡± strategy emerges for high transparency. Our results have implications for studies of human and animal social behaviour, especially for the analysis of dyadic and group interactions
%K Game theory
%K Prisoner's dilemma
%K Decision making
%K Games
%K Reaction time
%K Behavior
%K Animal behavior
%K Evolutionary algorithms
%U https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007588