Effects Of Status On Individual Cooperation In Social Dilemmas

Cooperation is the fundamental motive force of the progress of human society.The conflict between self-and other’s interest in social dilemma is the key factor that restricts cooperation behavior.The modern society urgently needs cooperation to solve the severe problems such as the shortage of resources and environmental pollution,so how to solve the social dilemma is particularly important.Previous research has found that social class can influence people’s cooperative behavior.This study is aimed at exploring effects of status on individual cooperation in social dilemmas.This study contains two sub-studies and use PGG to study cooperative behavior.Study 1a(N = 165)measured status,perspective-taking and cooperation to explored explore the mediating role of perspective-taking.Study 1b(N = 106)used experimental method to explore the mediating role of perspective-taking.Study 2a(N = 212)explored whether power has moderating effect on status,perspective-taking and cooperation.Study 2b(N = 219)used a 2(status: High / Low)× 2(power: High / low)experimental design to explore the effects of the interaction on perspective-taking and cooperation,and the moderating role of power in the mediating path of perspectivetaking.The results show that:(1)Status positively predicted cooperation(study 1a,1b,2a and 2b).(2)Perspective-taking mediated the relationship between status and cooperation.Individuals with high-status adopted high perspective-taking and more cooperation,while individuals with low-status adopted low perspective-taking and less cooperation(study 1a,1b,2a and 2b).(3)The relationship between status and perspective-taking is moderated by power.In low-power condition,the high-status people have high perspective-taking and more cooperation,while in high-power condition,the influence of status on cooperation is not significant(study 2a and 2b).This study provides direct and powerful evidence for the ability of status and cooperation,which enriches the theoretical connotation,and brings enlightenment to organizational management: to strengthen the consistency of individual right level and status level,which can promote the occurrence of cooperative behavior and conducive to the creation of organizational climate and improve organizational performance.