This project addresses how and why behavior in a resource dilemma differs when one only knows the choices of others versus only knows the state of the resource. Study 1 suggested that resource information is more valuable than social information, in that if the resource can be monitored, whether or not others’ choices can also be monitored has no impact on behavior. However, if the state of the resource is not known, the ability to know what others are doing is critical for cooperation. This seems to be because resource information encourages planning and long-term thinking, and social information encourages comparative thinking. Study 2 replicated the behavior pattern, revealed—surprisingly—that warnings that a resource is critically low undermine (rather than promote) cooperation, and that such responses depend on the availability of social and environmental information. Discussion focuses on how incomplete information about a resource might be addressed.
AuW. T.NgaiM. Y. (2003). Effects of group size uncertainty and protocol of play in a common pool resource dilemma. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 6, 265–283. doi:10.1177/13684302030063004
2.
BrucksW.Van LangeP. A. M. (2007). When prosocials act like proselfs in a commons dilemma. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 33, 750–758. doi:10.1177/0146167206298569
3.
BudescuD. V.RapoportA.SuleimanR. (1990). Resource dilemmas with environmental uncertainty and asymmetric players. European Journal of Social Psychology, 20, 475–487. doi:10.1002/ejsp.2420200603
4.
BushmanB. J. (2006). Effects of warning and information labels on attraction to television violence in viewers of different ages. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 36, 2073–2078. doi:10.1111/j.0021–9029.2006.00094.x
5.
CialdiniR. B. (2003). Crafting normative messages to protect the environment. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12, 105–109. doi:10.1111/1467–8721.01242
6.
De KwaadstenietE. W.van DijkE.De CremerD.de RooijM. (2007). Justifying decisions in social dilemmas: Justification pressures and tacit coordination under environmental uncertainty. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 33, 1648–1660. doi:10.1177/0146167207307490
7.
De KwaadstenietE. W.van DijkE.WitA.De CremerD. (2006). Social dilemmas as strong versus weak situations: Social value orientations and tacit coordination under resource size uncertainty. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42, 509–516. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2005.06.004
8.
De KwaadstenietE. W.van DijkE.WitA.De CremerD. (2010). Anger and retribution after collective overuse: The role of blaming and environmental uncertainty in social dilemmas. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 36, 59–70. doi:10.1177/0146167209352192
9.
FujitaK. (2008). Seeing the forest beyond the trees: A construal-level approach to self-control. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 3, 1475–1496. doi:10.1111/j.1751–9004.2008.00118.x
10.
FujitaK.TropeY.LibermanN.Levin-SagiM. (2006). Construal levels and self-control. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 351–367. doi:10.1037/0022–3514.90.3.351
11.
GiacomantonioM.De DreuC. K. W.ShalviS.SligteD.LederS. (2010). Psychological distance boosts value–behavior correspondence in ultimatum bargaining and integrative negotiation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 46, 824–829. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2010.05.001
12.
GustafssonM.BielA.GärlingT. (1999a). Outcome-desirability bias in resource management problems. Thinking and Reasoning, 5, 327–337. doi:10.1080/135467899393968
13.
GustafssonM.BielA.GärlingT. (1999b). Overharvesting of resources of unknown size. Acta Psychologica, 103, 47–64. doi:10.1016/s0001–6918(99)00024–4
14.
GustafssonM.BielA.GärlingT. (2000). Egoism bias in social dilemmas with resource uncertainty. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, 4, 351–365. doi:10.1177/1368430200003004002
15.
HuntC. V.KimA.BorgidaE.ChaikenS. (2010). Revisiting the self-interest versus values debate: The role of temporal perspective. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 46, 1155–1158. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2010.05.004
16.
JoiremanJ.PoseyD. C.TrueloveH. B.ParksC. D. (2009). The environmentalist who cried drought: Reactions to repeated warnings about depleted resources under conditions of uncertainty. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 29, 181–192. doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2008.10.003
17.
JoiremanJ. A.Van LangeP. A. M.Van VugtM. (2004). Who cares about the environmental impact of cars? Those with an eye toward the future. Environment and Behavior, 36, 187–206. doi:10.1177/0013916503251476
18.
KerrN. L.RumbleA. C.ParkE. S.ParksC. D.OuwerkerkJ. W.GallucciM.Van LangeP. A. M. (2009). “How many bad apples does it take to spoil the whole barrel?”: Social exclusion and tolerance for bad apples. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 603–613. doi:10.1016/j.jesp.2009.02.017
19.
KimH.SchnallS.WhiteM. P. (2013). Similar psychological distance reduces temporal discounting. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39, 1005–1016. doi:10.1177/0146167213488214
20.
KramerR. M.McClintockC. G.MessickD. M. (1986). Social values and cooperative response to a simulated resource conservation crisis. Journal of Personality, 54, 576–591. doi:10.1111/j.1467–6494.1986.tb00413.x
21.
LoomisD. K.SamuelsonC. D.SellJ. A. (1995). Effects of harvest information and motivational orientation on harvest of a declining renewable resource. Society and Natural Resources, 8, 1–18. doi:10.1080/08941929509380895
22.
MarxS. M.WeberE. U.OrloveB. S.LeiserowitzA.KrantzD. H.PhillipsJ. (2007). Communication and mental processes: Experiential and analytic processing of uncertain climate information. Global Environmental Change, 17, 47–58. doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2006.10.004
23.
McCarterM. W.RockmannK. W.NorthcraftG. B. (2010). Is it even worth it? The effect of loss prospects in the outcome distribution of a public goods dilemma. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 111, 1–12. doi:10.1016/j.obhdp.2009.06.003
24.
MessickD. M.AllisonS. T.SamuelsonC. D. (1988). Framing and communication effects on group members’ responses to environmental and social uncertainty. In MaitalS. (Ed.), Applied behavioral economics (Vol. 2, pp. 677–700). New York, NY: New York University Press.
25.
ParksC. D.JoiremanJ.Van LangeP. A. M. (2013). Cooperation, trust, and antagonism: How public goods are promoted. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14, 117–165. doi:10.1177/1529100612474436
26.
ParksC. D.RumbleA. C.PoseyD. C. (2002). The effects of envy on reciprocation in social dilemmas. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 522–534. doi:10.1177/0146167202287008
27.
ParksC. D.SannaL. J.PoseyD. C. (2003). Retrospection in social dilemmas: How thinking about the past affects future cooperation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84, 988–996. doi:10.1037/0022–3514.84.5.988
28.
RapoportA.AuW. T. (2001). Bonus and penalty in common pool resource dilemmas under uncertainty. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 85, 135–165. doi:10.1006/obhd.2000.2935
29.
ReesW. (2010). What’s blocking sustainability? Human nature, cognition, and denial. Sustainability, 6, 13–25.
30.
SuleimanR.RapoportA. (1988). Environmental and social uncertainty in single-trial resource dilemmas. Acta Psychologica, 68, 99–112. doi:10.1016/0001–6918(88)90048–0
31.
SzolnokiA.PercM. (2012). Conditional strategies and the evolution of cooperation in spatial public goods games. Physical Review E, 85, 026104. doi:10.1103/PhysRevE.85.026104
Van DijkE.WilkeH.WilkeM.MetmanL. (1999). What information do we use in social dilemmas? Environmental uncertainty and the employment of coordination rules. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35, 109–135. doi:10.1006/jesp.1998.1366
34.
Van DijkE.WitA.WilkeH. A. M.BudescuD. V. (2004). What we know (and do not know) about the effects of uncertainty on behavior in social dilemmas. In SuleimanR.BudescuD. V.FischerI.MessickD. M. (Eds.), Contemporary psychological research on social dilemmas (pp. 315–331). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
35.
Van LangeP. A. M.JoiremanJ.ParksC. D.van DijkE. (2013). The psychology of social dilemmas: A review. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 120, 125–141. doi:10.1016/j.obhdp.2012.11.003
36.
Van LangeP. A. M.OuwerkerkJ.TazelaarM. (2002). How to overcome the detrimental effects of noise in social interaction: The benefits of generosity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 82, 768–780. doi:10.1037/0022–3514.82.5.768
37.
VuoleviJ. H. K.Van LangeP. A. M. (2010). Beyond the information given: The power of the belief in self-interest. European Journal of Social Psychology, 40, 26–34. doi:10.1002/ejsp.711
38.
WatkinsE.MouldsM. (2005). Distinct modes of ruminative self-focus: Impact of abstract versus concrete rumination of problem solving in depression. Emotion, 5, 319–328. doi:10.1037/1528–3542.5.3.319
39.
WitA.van DijkE.WilkeH. A. M.GroenenboomA. (2004). The interplay between environmental and social uncertainty in social dilemmas. In SuleimanR.BudescuD. V.FischerI.MessickD. M. (Eds.), Contemporary psychological research on social dilemmas (pp. 376–398). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
40.
YamagishiT.KanazawaS.MashimaR.TeraiS. (2005). Separating trust from cooperation in a dynamic relationship: Prisoner’s Dilemma with variable dependence. Rationality and Society, 17, 275–308. doi:10.1177/1043463105055463
41.
YorkR. (2010). Three lessons from trends in CO2 emissions and energy use in the United States. Society and Natural Resources, 23, 1244–1252. doi:10.1080/08941920903421133
