Cooperation in polygynous households
Using a carefully designed series of public goods games, we compare, across monogamous and polygynous households, the willingness of husbands and wives to cooperate to maximize household gains. Compared to monogamous husbands and wives, polygynous husbands and wives are less cooperative, one with an...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
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American Economic Association
2018
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| Online Access: | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/52349/ |
| _version_ | 1848798706462097408 |
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| author | Barr, Abigail Dekker, Marleen Janssens, Wendy Kebede, Bereket Kramer, Berber |
| author_facet | Barr, Abigail Dekker, Marleen Janssens, Wendy Kebede, Bereket Kramer, Berber |
| author_sort | Barr, Abigail |
| building | Nottingham Research Data Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Using a carefully designed series of public goods games, we compare, across monogamous and polygynous households, the willingness of husbands and wives to cooperate to maximize household gains. Compared to monogamous husbands and wives, polygynous husbands and wives are less cooperative, one with another, and co-wives are least cooperative, one with another. The husbands’ and wives’ behavior in a corresponding series of inter-household games indicates that these differences cannot be attributed to selection of less cooperative people into polygyny. Finally, behavior in polygynous households is more reciprocal and less apparently altruistic. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:24:02Z |
| format | Article |
| id | nottingham-52349 |
| institution | University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T20:24:02Z |
| publishDate | 2018 |
| publisher | American Economic Association |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | nottingham-523492020-05-04T19:34:56Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/52349/ Cooperation in polygynous households Barr, Abigail Dekker, Marleen Janssens, Wendy Kebede, Bereket Kramer, Berber Using a carefully designed series of public goods games, we compare, across monogamous and polygynous households, the willingness of husbands and wives to cooperate to maximize household gains. Compared to monogamous husbands and wives, polygynous husbands and wives are less cooperative, one with another, and co-wives are least cooperative, one with another. The husbands’ and wives’ behavior in a corresponding series of inter-household games indicates that these differences cannot be attributed to selection of less cooperative people into polygyny. Finally, behavior in polygynous households is more reciprocal and less apparently altruistic. American Economic Association 2018-05-02 Article PeerReviewed Barr, Abigail, Dekker, Marleen, Janssens, Wendy, Kebede, Bereket and Kramer, Berber (2018) Cooperation in polygynous households. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics . ISSN 1945-7790 (In Press) household resource allocation; cooperative decision-making; polygyny; Nigeria |
| spellingShingle | household resource allocation; cooperative decision-making; polygyny; Nigeria Barr, Abigail Dekker, Marleen Janssens, Wendy Kebede, Bereket Kramer, Berber Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title | Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title_full | Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title_fullStr | Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title_full_unstemmed | Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title_short | Cooperation in polygynous households |
| title_sort | cooperation in polygynous households |
| topic | household resource allocation; cooperative decision-making; polygyny; Nigeria |
| url | https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/52349/ |