Individual and collective gains from cooperation and reciprocity in a dynamic-network Prisoner’s Dilemma driven by extraversion, openness, and agreeableness
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: How do stable personality differences shape cooperation when social ties can form and dissolve? We model a repeated Prisoner's Dilemma on an endogenous network in which three continuous Big Five traits map to transparent local mechanisms: Extraversion sets a target number of partners, Openness determines how broadly agents search beyond friends-of-friends, and Agreeableness sets a baseline willingness to cooperate. At each encounter, agents combine this baseline with the partner's directly observed history; there are no trait labels, gossip, or global reputations. Ties form when agents are under-connected and are cut when they become over-connected, with cuts prioritising partners who have defected more often. We vary network size (N=30-200), population composition, and the balance between trait-driven and history-driven behaviour. Three robust patterns emerge. First, cooperate first, then reciprocate-high initial willingness to cooperate combined with history-sensitive response-produces systems that are simultaneously more prosperous, fairer, and safer. Second, personality has predictable conditional effects: Agreeableness helps when history matters but hurts when behaviour is mostly trait-driven; Extraversion amplifies the environment; Openness has little net payoff effect. Third, the network reorganises accordingly: degree assortativity stays near zero, whereas agreeable agents increasingly connect to one another when cooperation takes hold.
Source: Scientific Reports
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,690
Awards: G1175115578, G2262748287, COSMOS, Computer Science for Complex System modelling, G2825053243, G294895050, G300979063, G3020948319, G34346518, G3480869486, G3798187479, G3845300180, G3894604288, G425668148, G4526231891, G5080475149, G7084143925, G7153128315, Sistemas de Información Distribuidos (SID), G8574095611
OpenAlex ID: W7155555622
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