Abstract:

Social dilemmas are situations in which individual rationality leads to collective irrationality. Advances in research for social dilemmas require a new kind of micro–meso–macro framework for understanding already existing theories. Based on these different theories, experimental research uses games as tasks to investigate basic psychological processes or to study the structural or environmental factors that influence individuals’ behavioral choice in social dilemmas, and thus develops corresponding solutions to social dilemmas. Development of theory, improvement of experimental tasks, and experimental external validity all indicate prospects for future social dilemmas research via experimental methods.

Key words: Decision-making, social dilemmas, cooperation, experimental research