Transforming Competitive or Cooperative Climates

Abstract

In two studies 200 subjects played repeated trials of Prisoner's Dilemma with a simulated other who could send verbal communications. In the first study, the other began intensifying conflict by being behaviorally unresponsive over a long duration, by being totally noncooperative, by responding more quickly to the competition than the cooperation of the subject, or by coercing cooperation with threats for the purpose of exploitation. Then the other introduced a program of carefully communicated conciliation. The results showed a significant increase in cooperation by the subjects across conditions. In the second study, the subjects' competition was intensified by the other's choice of verbal communication—threat, insult, or challenge. Then the other introduced conciliation; the subjects responded cooperatively in all cases. Finally, the other lapsed into uncommunicated competition, and the subjects became highly competitive once more. The results are discussed in terms of Deutsch's (1983) “crude law of social relations” and the evidence suggesting that an atmosphere of either cooperation or competition can be quickly altered in a situation of interdependence when one party clearly acts inconsistently with what is characteristic of that climate.