Analyzing a Journal Article on Dynamic Influences of Culture on Cooperation in the Prisoner’s Dilemma

Running head: CULTURE ON COOPERATION IN PRISONER'S DILEMMA1
“Dynamic Influences of Culture on Cooperation in the Prisoner's Dilemma”: A Critique
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“Dynamic Influences of Culture on Cooperation in the Prisoner's Dilemma”: A Critique 1. Summary
In “Dynamic Influences of Culture on Cooperation in the Prisoner's Dilemma” Wong and Hong (2005) propose a new assumption about culture priming of select cultural groups namely, Chinese Americans vis-à-vis Americans. In contrast to sweeping behavioral patterns
across situations, Wong and Hong hypothesize that, offered specific cooperation/defection situa-tions, Chinese-American participants, exhibiting bicultural knowledge repertoires (i.e. Chinese and American), “ would be more likely to cooperate with friends when their Chinese cultural knowledge was activated than when their American cultural knowledge was activated,” whilst such “difference would disappear when they interacted with strangers” (p. 430). Put differently, cultural priming, triggered in certain situations yet not in all situations, is more likely to generate certain behaviors, or behavioral patterns of cooperation among Chinese-American participants, particularly during interactions with friends and with higher expectations for cooperation if given a choice, compared to American participants.
The study adopts a fairly straightforward methodology. Essentially, 171 participants (67 males and 104 females) are, first, culturally primed – i.e. exposed to Chinese and American cul-tural icons – in order to trigger, or activate, internalized cultural repertoires and, next, partici-pants are introduced into Prisoner's Dilemma game where players are given an option to choose between Strategy A (cooperation and hence higher joint outcome) and Strategy B (defection and hence higher individual outcome). To isolate any peer pressure to act in a certain way, study au-thors announce overall score of all five rounds, instead for each round, so players are unable to figure out which strategy a particular participant has chosen in any given round. The expectations
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as well as motivation to opt for one strategy are measured using a 1-8 scale (1: very confident that the partner has chosen Strategy B; and 8: very confident that the partner has chosen Strategy A) (p. 431).
Using a logit regression, mean percentage of cooperation (vs. defection) in six Prime Context conditions shows Prime X Context analysis variance is significant for cooperation, ex-pectations and motivation for Chinese-American participants when partners are friends and non-differential for Chinese-American and American participants when partners are strangers.
The results or findings, conclude study authors, confirm initial hypothesis: “Chinese culture primes activated more cooperation with friends than did American culture primes, where-as there was no systematic effect of prime on cooperation with strangers” (p. 433). More general-ly, study findings have far-reaching implications for group collaborati...