Abstract: People often punish other individuals who behave negatively or uncooperatively to promote cooperation even when it comes at personal cost, and when there is no expectation of receiving any material returns. We define this behavior as altruistic punishment. Here, we review the summation of experimental paradigm, process of altruistic punishment evolution and generalizes inequity aversion, theory of mind and empathy to be key factors which induce the behaviors of altruism punishment from current empirical literatures. In addition, altruism punishment-related brain basis has been reviewed and the review also highlights this field’s possible future.

Key words: altruism punishment, inequity aversion, theory of mind, empathy, neural evidence