Threshold behavior of a social norm in response to error proneness

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the stability of a social norm, specifically Simple Standing, depends on the error proneness of individuals, revealing a threshold beyond which the norm becomes vulnerable to invasion by mutants with higher error rates.

Contribution

It uncovers the threshold behavior of Simple Standing, showing that its stability depends on individuals' error proneness, which is a novel perspective in social norm analysis.

Findings

Simple Standing resists mutants with low error proneness

Beyond a certain error threshold, mutants invade and destabilize the norm

Stability depends on individuals' error probability as an attribute

Abstract

A social norm defines what is good and what is bad in social contexts, as well as what to do based on such assessments. A stable social norm should be maintained against errors committed by its players. In addition, individuals may have different probabilities of errors in following the norm, and a social norm would be unstable if it benefited those who do not follow the norm carefully. In this work, we show that Simple Standing, which has been known to resist errors and mutants successfully, actually exhibits threshold behavior. That is, in a population of individuals playing the donation game according to Simple Standing, the residents can suppress the invasion of mutants with higher error proneness only if the residents' own error proneness is sufficiently low. Otherwise, the population will be invaded by mutants that commit assessment errors more frequently, and a series of such invasions will eventually undermine the existing social norm. This study suggests that the stability analysis of a social norm may have a different picture if the probability of error itself is regarded as an individual attribute.