Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2013
Abstract
Is the sense of fairness uniquely human? Human reactions to reward division are often studied by means of the Ultimatum Game (UG), in which both partners need to agree on a distribution for both to receive rewards. Humans typically offer generous portions of the reward to their partner, a tendency our close primate relatives have thus far failed to show in experiments. Here, we tested chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and human children on a modified UG. One individual chose between two tokens that, with their partner's cooperation, could be exchanged for rewards. One token offered equal rewards to both players, whereas the other token favored the chooser. Both apes and children responded like humans typically do. If their partner's cooperation was required, they split the rewards equally. However, with passive partners -- a situation akin to the so-called Dictator Game -- they preferred the selfish option. Thus, humans and chimpanzees show similar preferences regarding reward division, suggesting a long evolutionary history to the human sense of fairness.
Recommended Citation
Proctor, D., Williamson, R.A., de Waal, F.B.M., Brosnan, S.F. (2013). Chimpanzees play the ultimatum game. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 110(6), 2070-2075. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1220806110
Figure 1
Brosnan_ChimpUltimatumGameFigure2_PNAS2013.pdf (92 kB)
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Comments
This article was originally published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Copyright © 2013 National Academy of Sciences.
The post-peer-reviewed-version is available here with the permission of the author.