Evolution of cooperation and costly incentives in the continuous snowdrift game

TL;DR

This paper investigates how costly rewards influence the evolution of cooperation in the continuous snowdrift game, revealing that such rewards can promote evolutionary branching and improve social welfare.

Contribution

It introduces the impact of costly rewards on the continuous snowdrift game, highlighting their role in fostering evolutionary branching and social welfare enhancement.

Findings

Costly rewards promote evolutionary branching.

Evolutionary branching facilitates the emergence of pool rewards.

Pool rewards enhance social welfare.

Abstract

Game theory research on the snowdrift game has showed that gradual evolution of the continuously varying level of cooperation in joint enterprises can demonstrate evolutionary merging as well as evolutionary branching. However, little is known about the consequences of changes in diversity at the cooperation level. In the present study I consider effects of costly rewards on the continuous snowdrift game. I show that not evolutionary merging but evolutionary branching can promote the emergence of pool reward, which can then enhance social welfare.