Trust matters: a cross-cultural comparison of Northern Ghana and Oaxaca groups

661A cross-cultural analysis of trust and cooperation networks in Northern Ghana (NGHA) and Oaxaca (OAX) was carried out by means of ego networks and interviews. These regions were chosen because both are inhabited by several ethnic groups, thus providing a good opportunity to test the cultural group selection hypothesis. Against the predictions of this approach, we found that in both regions cooperation is grounded in personal trust groups, and that social cohesion depends on these emotional bonds. Moreover, in agreement with Fiske's notion of “evolved proclivities,” we also found two distinct kinds of trust networks, one for each region, which vary in terms of the degree of ethnic interrelation. This pattern suggests that social cohesion increases when environmental resources are scarce.S

Personal Trust Increases Cooperation beyond General Trust

-In this paper we present a new methodology which, while allowing for anonymous interaction, it also makes possible to compare decisions of cooperating or defecting when playing games within a group, according to whether or not players personally trust each other. The design thus goes beyond standard approaches to the role of trust in fostering cooperation, which is restricted to general trust. It also allows considering the role of the topology of the social network involved may play in the level of cooperation found. The results of this work support the idea that personal trust promotes cooperation beyond the level of general trust. We also found that this effect carries over to the whole group, making it more cohesive, but that higher levels of cohesion rely on a particular topology. As a conclusion, we hypothesize that personal trust is a psychological mechanism evolved to make human social life possible in the small groups our ancestors lived in, and that this mechanism persists and plays a role in sustaining cooperation and social cohesion.S

A critical review of Dunbar’s social brain hypothesis = Una revisión crítica de la hipótesis del cerebro social de Dunbar

e037Dunbar’s social brain hypothesis constitutes an influential position among those that relate the evolution of human cognition and sociality. In this work, we first present the essentials of the theory and discuss the paleoanthropological and social evidence claimed to support it. We also point out its shortcomings, which have to do with the general strategy of finding linear relations among different traits, the lack of attention to the mental capacities that make human social life possible, and the diversity of social relations and structures that take place. We put forward our way of complementing Dunbar’s approach by focusing on the role of trust in cementing society and explaining diversity.S

The influence of social bonds, emotions and personality on punishment attitudes.

From an evolutionary point of view, different emotions such as jealousy and attitudes of trust seem to have influenced close and affective bonds, and cooperative behaviors respectively, both of them key pillars that contribute to guaranteeing, at different levels, the maintenance of the social bonds that form human groups. However, although punishment attitudes have been widely used in the analysis of the evolution of cooperation, they does not seem very relevant to explain cooperation and, therefore, the motivations that induce punishment attitudes remains unclear. In this study, carried out on 174 participants, questionnaires and economic games were combined, the former to try to know aspects of the participants’ personality that may affect their interpersonal relationships, and the latter to try to induce different emotions and punishment behaviors, which allow us to advance to know more about the factors that promote these punishing attitudes. The results of the study provide different information about the emotions that are generated when presenting an unfavorable situation for the individual in different types of relationships, about how these induced emotions are related to each other and to different types of personality, and about what effect all these combinations may have to cause punishing attitudes. We try to test the hypothesis that punishment will depend on the type of relationship, which generates different emotional levels that, together with individuals' personality, will explain the different levels of punishment.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Trust-Based Altruism Facing New Contexts: The Vyegwa-Gika Pygmies from Burundi

0204321The community of Pygmies settled in Vyegwa-Gika provides an exceptional case study to test the role of trust in the evolution of altruism. The Vyegwa-Gika Pygmies were forced to migrate from rainforests to the savanna, changing quickly their environment, culture, and socio-economic situation. Despite the high level of poverty they suffer in this new settlement, we found evidence of strong altruistic attitudes toward trustees when playing an economic game. In addition, Vyegwa-Gika Pygmies keep small personal trust networks despite the fact they share frequent social interactions within the community. These results indicate the great effectiveness of personal trust in fostering altruism, even if the circumstances make it difficult to establish such kind of affective bonds. A theory of the evolution of altruism should therefore also account for the evolution of psychology of trust, as a key element in the process.S