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Developing Cooperation Context Index for

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 Developing Cooperation Context Index for Countries using
Partial Least Squares Approach

Alessandro Merletti De Palo a, S. Mostafa Rasoolimanesh b *, Fabio Marigo c, Gianna S. Monti d,

and Mariangela Nitti e,

a
cooperacy org., Italy
b
Housing, Building, and Planning School, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia
c
University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy
d
University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, Management and Statistics, Italy
e
University of Salento, Department of History, Society and Human Studies, Italy

Introduction
This paper attempts to develop a Cooperation Context Index (CCI) based on the data of countries from all around the
world. In this article we review the approach of game theory to cooperation science. The major trends in game theory
are compared with the semantic clusters exposed in our previous article [1], and in our first Cooperation model [2],
according to a human perspective following an interdisciplinary approach. Equivalence, Trust, Care, Transparency,
Freedom, Understanding, Diversity are proposed as major dimensions of the phenomenon. Further discussion about
intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, rewards and punishments, reputation and gossip, perfect and false information,
diversity, identity and personality is proposed in the annex 1. The conclusive remarks suggest to have a more systemic
approach in order to avoid the loops of reputation and false information, punishment-retaliation, extrinsic motivations
and distortion of the self, resulting in the loss of the unique personal diversity of everyone of us and subsequently of
the groups we live in. The same is valid, for a wider range application, at the national level, which is the social
dimension of our analysis. The proposed Cooperation Context Index it is not thought as a performative index, and it
may used to indicates where is possible to have a cooperative social system or where the possibility of cooperation is
not inhibited, for those countries who want to align their politics to the enjoyment of their citizens.
The conditions of Cooperation based on the game theory review, when systemically analyzed, generate the
Cooperation Context Index. These components are based on the indicators from international reports, which may be
both reflective and formative (composite). We applied a partial least squares (PLS) approach to assess the
measurement model of CCI. The CCI is a very complex higher-order construct including reflective and composite
indicators and lower-order constructs. The embedded components, research method, findings, and discussion follow
the description of the seven dimensions emerging from the game theory review. The paper is ended by presenting the
score of CCI in 148 countries worldwide, and with a final theoretical annex.

1 GAME THEORY AND HUMAN PERSPECTIVE

Game theory has been widely used to try and predict interaction outcomes in terms of offspring payoffs, evolutionary
stable functionalities (strategies) and evolutionary dynamics between different traits in laboratory experimentations.
While some scholars point out that offspring payoff should be measured as relative offspring payoff, because It
doesnt matter how many offspring you have; it only matters that you have more than anyone else [3], early game
theory laboratory experiments with humans switched to symbolic payoffs in order to see whether cooperation - or
altruism, or egoism - could be explored with the same mechanisms, unfortunately merging the proximate and the
ultimate levels, that is, commodifying survival and offsprings turning them into money. Evolutionary biologists,
evolutionary psychologists, social physicists and many other scholars from other different disciplines observed the
results of several experimentations in game theory with human participants. After 20 years of experimentation, some
other scholars [4] pointed at the hypertrophic production of scientific articles based on game theory that didnt provide
efficient predictive theories. The first cooperative game theory ideas appeared in [0] [see also 5], well before the
seminal article by von Neumann and Morgenstern, in 1944. After the fundamental step forward in the 50s, weve seen
60 years of further experimentation, through classical and evolutionary game theory, and still scholars disagree about
the different outcomes of different games and different experimentations in the laboratory as well as in the field (for
example [6] and commentary). The efforts by humans in experimenting ways of understanding - and, in some sense,
fostering - cooperation are copious. It seems like there's a common desire -and a common quest- amongst scholars
in finding how cooperation evolved and ways to gain more cooperation in our society, which means somehow that
our genes and memes are working against the Dawkin's "banker", the payoff distribution manager, in order to share
instead of winning competition prizes [7]. Game theory design is however definitely interesting at a human level, as
contexts in which we see that memory, experience, communication and agreements arent admitted are probable ones
in which fear to be betrayed -and not selfishness [8]- may better enact competition rather than cooperation. Besides
all, sixty years of game theory have been dedicated to the analysis of diverse phenomena in human behavior. Game
theory is a model, and, as every model, is wrong but can be very useful [9]. When it refers to non-evolutive
advantages, it can be a method to simplify human social interactions and see what happens in different and less
complex systems, keeping in mind results based on money or other benefits different than offspring payoffs appear
useful to see the effect of evolutionary theory patterns on actual human behavior, but not the other way around, that
is, to prove evolutionary theories. More straight to the point: is having more money the same as reproducing more or
saving your genes? Is monetary wealth correlated with more offsprings at national levels? Current data do not seem
to sustain this hypothesis (The World Bank), although we have no data about our remote ancestors, and evolution
spans through millennia, not through decades. Game theory is therefore quite effective in understanding human
behavior in social games. But does the usual game theory experimentations amount, ten dollars, represent a life-saving
amount or a real possibility of having more offsprings? Even if we could consider offsprings, sometimes logarithmic
calculation of fitness payoff or offspring payoff have been proposed as more effective [10], sometimes more than one
generation of offspring payoff is needed [11]. Moreover, applied game theory is more related to phenotypes rather
than genotypes [12]. The complexity of genetic populations, genetic drifts and biology frequent exceptions [13] to
general rules seem too intense to make the simple ten dollars sum resemble ten surviving offsprings or even a tenth of
them. Nevertheless, the 77 article by Pruitt and Kimmel pointed out a good way to leverage the huge quantity of
information we collected from game theory experimentations: categorizing interesting trends. We try to do the same
in the following paragraphs, maintaining the categories we propose in our model (for a good review of the rational,
evolutionary and network game theory see [5]).

2 EQUIVALENCE: balance, proportional benefits, goods. - Real Benefit

Participants tend to desire to reciprocate the behavior of other participants, probably to have an equivalence of benefits
and avoid differences in benefits attribution or in assets at start. Equivalence does not mean equality. Cooperation
raises through equivalence and not equality or homogeneity: the proportional rule in public good games is able to
bring to a 100% level of cooperators [14]. Other scholars found that the best reciprocity is achieved when the two
sides have similar powers and no side is able to force the reciprocity [4, 15-21], while there is more reciprocity
towards who has a large amount of power [22-23] even if the other side is in need, although in that case the more the
need, the more the reciprocation [24]. Individuals with greater physical or social capital can punish with less risk of
retaliation and with greater efficacy [25]. Difference of gains generates annoyance [26-27]. Inequities in food sharing
are also considered [28-30] but see [31].
What has been observed is that, even if rationally its good to get even a low share than nothing, unfair distributions
are rejected, and, when the player could rationally keep the maximum amount of money and distribute shares of zero
value, this rarely happens. On the contrary, humans are happy to share, even if it varies a lot according to many
variables, including the culture in which the experimentation takes place and the experimentation procedures [6].
How did this kind of justice or equivalence evolve in humans? The equivalence principle is so sensible that
gaining benefits with or without effort makes a difference. If a large effort is seen, people are ready to give more to
who made the strong effort than what they would have kept for themselves. Rarely game theory experimentations
evaluate this aspect [32-34] that seems to be related, again, with the idea of a proportional reward [14].
In order to separate the simple equivalence of goods or money from that of rewards and punishment, in our model
equivalence is more related to quantifiable goods or money disposal from an economic point of view.
Outside the game theory field, Nobel Prize Elinor Ostrom [35] pointed out how cooperation can be fostered in a social
system based on equivalent shares from a common pool.
The equivalence construct is therefore measured using: GINI index, Income share held by highest 10%, etc. These
indexes measure the distribution of wealth in the population, hence when wealth is evenly distributed, people may live
equivalent lives, transforming their wealth into satisfying needs, desired goods, life choices.
Cooperation may only spread when people receive equivalent benefits.

3 TRUST: expectations, probability of positive events from other

participants based on past frequencies. - Relational Benefit
Just like the confusion about the term cooperation, the word trust has been used with many meanings: different
field develop different definitions, and synonyms range through competence, credibility, confidence, faith, hope,
loyalty, reliance [36-37]. Basically, what we are talking about here is a probability, and the dimension this probability
is based on is the time aspect of human interactions. If an interaction is contemporary and concludes its scope and its
consequences in the exact moment in which it is enacted, we wont need any trust. Of course these extreme conditions
are only theoretical, and resemble the economic concept of service. The service idea pertains to the world of
present effects: goods, instead, may be later on be transferred. The frequency of positive events or neurological
rewards that occurred in the past generates a feeling that something similar will happen in the future. The odds that
we feel about a future positive outcome in our relation with another human can be called trust. Interactions usually
have previous cases, and often humans estimate future effects. Trust is therefore, generally, a predictive probability
curve, involving the time perspective from which an individual or a group make decisions about their interaction with
each other (for a similar definition see [38], based on frequencies and altered by confirmation bias and other kind of
biases like hyperbolic overvaluation of imminent outcomes [39-40]. We personally think of it as a dual variable curve,
ruled by prediction on one side (accountability, calculativeness: [36]), and by emotion on the other (emotive-
affective-preference-based trust). Together, rational prediction and irrational preferences merge into what we call
expectations, influenced by social and environmental contexts. Trust seems to be, subsequently, highly systemic.
So far, while economic models may be predictive of accountability, emotive trust tends to be part of irrational human
preferences and therefore pertains to psychological and sociological models [36]. In economy and psychology, trust
has been connected with vulnerability, or the possibility to receive a negative benefit [41;37]. The opposite of trust
could be represented by fear, or the opposite probability (1-p) of a negative outcome. This has also be called shadow
of the future [42], and plays in game theory experimentations as negative trust or distrust.
Being related to time, trust involves memory, also called history [41]. The simplest way to approach memory and
history related to trust is to consider frequencies. The occurrence that soldiers on a trench usually had a one hour pause
at lunch and therefore didnt fire, made German and British soldiers coordinate into a common daily pause from the
military conflict [42;43].
Some people call trust the expectation of cooperation [44]. A very interesting area of study would be cooperation
involving short term memory compared with one involving a long term memory, both in humans and in other species.
In his final discussion Gambetta suggests that trust is a condition for cooperation, but it could also be considered a
byproduct of cooperation. A good cooperation, in fact, may bring good results and therefore a good level of trust. It is
probably an approach willing to indicate that a good systemic balance -or a good social system- may trigger trust in
their participants.
Trust can be motivated by intrinsic desire or extrinsic factors, like punishment, rewards, or relative instrumental
strategies (in this case the term strategy is well appropriated). When motivated by extrinsic factors, trust is not genuine,
and its ability in fostering cooperation could be undermined [45-55]. Betrayal at the end of reiterated game theory
games [56;42] can be explained with the growing absence of extrinsic motivations to cooperate due to the shadow of
the future threat or the presence of instrumental trust [49-50]. Earlier experimentation in the 1970s already saw the
presence of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations to reciprocal altruism influenced by power and punishment [4],
followed by similar results in the 1990s (like in [57], after [58] and recently [49-50]): shadow of the future and threats
undermine intrinsic motivation to reciprocate and force it with an extrinsic power.
It is also important to return to another aspect relating to time and expectations, that is, the hyperbolic overvaluation
of imminent outcomes [39-40]. According to this verified theory, our valuation is biased by giving more importance
to an egg today rather than a hen tomorrow (Ad praesens ova cras pullis sunt meliora). The same reciprocal altruism
would fail if temporal discounting wouldnt be balanced with morality [59]. When long-range thinking instead arises,
the different parties in an experimental game start considering their interdependence [49;60-61].
Many cognitive bias affect our evaluations, and although some scholars dont support that biases might reduce the
effectiveness of decision making [62], it is important not to forget this other level of diversity about human individual
cognitive activity. While we characterize immediate passions as irrational and long term decisions as more reasonable,
we should also take into account that our evaluations are based on both measurable and accountable quantities and
complex, irrational and relational-based, context-based qualities.
This construct is measured by a number of indices such as: Delegation to authority, Reliability of banks, Consensus
building, Criminal Justice, Functioning of government, Efficient legal network, Wastefulness of government
spending, etc. These indexes measure the level of probability the government and other nation-wide businesses or
institutions maintain and respect what they propose, as well as the rules they set up, allowing the citizens sufficient
level of accountability in their countries.
Cooperation only spreads when people may rely in the future according to their evaluations. A context where
uncertainty reigns cannot allow cooperation to appear.

4 CARE: effects, services, facilities - real benefit.

While trust regards time and personal preference curves, physical or psychological punishment and rewards are more
related to effects on individual perceptions and lives. Care is strongly connected with trust, but does not refer to
expectations, rather to real, happened or happening effects.
With punishment and rewards we leave the realm of past and future time -even if they affect trust- and enter the realm
of present effects. In economy, this is usually the realm of services and facilities, as effects arent tangible things,
cannot be separated from the provider and production and consumption happen at the same time [63-64]. In our model
this applies even when the punishment is a subtraction of money or goods, or the reward is a prize, again in terms of
money or goods. Equivalence is simply based on a current balance of giving and getting, and differences of static and
current assets, or having, as in access to goods and money. Care is more based on the balance between effects
resulting out of services and facilities.
Effects derived by a service or a facility can be pleasant or unpleasant, and game theory has been focusing on this two
specific provisionings of effects. Punishments represent something unpleasant the individual should dislike and
rewards, instead, something pleasurable the individual should like. In some sense, the care condition seems to be
referred to the avoidance of unnecessary negative services like violence, disrespect, contempt while having a balance
in the distribution of desirable services.
As we have seen, retaliation is not a solution -even when it re-establishes an equilibrium- due to the risk of possible
reactions that break the same balance obtained and the subsequent ignition of feuds. A caring attitude, or forgiveness,
is suggested towards those who defect because of fear to be defected, as well as to avoid endless retaliation [42],
also because cooperation is usually the preferred strategy [65] and aversion to betrayal rather than selfishness causes
humans to choose differently [8]. When we allow people to stop playing instead of risking to face the shadow of the
future or their same failed aspirations, we can talk about dormant individuals, that is, players that stop playing if
they get lower payoffs [66]. This could be interpreted as people who dont retaliate, and seems to positively affect the
game.
When in a country we have no basic services related to health, food, safety and the distribution of the same basic
services is unbalanced, we are in a similar situation like a public game in which who does not contributes to the public
gets severely punished, but the distribution step gives rewards only to some of the participants. Caring economics
perspectives [67] foster partnership and participation at company, community and national level, introducing relational
services aside to the standard kind of services considered in economy.

The adopted indices to measure this construct include: Births attended by skilled health staff, Number of under-five
deaths, Number of infant deaths, CDM Number of maternal deaths, Pregnant women receiving prenatal care,
Prevalence of stunting, etc. These indexes measure the basic level of services without which people may even risk
their lives. This lack of care inhibits cooperation and tends to trigger conflicts between people who have better services
and people who do not.
5 TRANSPARENCY: access to unaltered information and data - real
benefit
Transparency is intended as a special negative-value service not included in Care. When access to information or
transparency is inhibited or altered, like in the case of political information control or simply by noise, equivocations
worsen the situation [68-69]. Moreover, ambiguity is detrimental for cooperation [70]. The idea that the more we
know, the more we care [71] explains why the possibility of communication enhances cooperation in game theory
experimentations [4], but of course misinformation and lies can trigger opposite outcomes. Entering the realm of
information, we should bother about the fact that information could be altered, and therefore its access denied.
Organizing reputation of information in groups of disclosing people could momentarily raise transparency and
cooperation, but in the long run many would attempt to enter the disclosing groups in order to exploit them [72].
Nevertheless, it is cognitively less costly to tell the truth [73]. The high risk with reputation is that of false reputation
[74], even if listeners can detect lies [75]: the many studies of gossip apparently seem to be insufficient to maintain
correct information without countermeasures (for example [76-77] but mainly [78-81]), as gossip can spread hoaxes
as well. Social networks have been studied in relation to spread of information, simple contagion and complex
contagion [82-83] and deeply analyzed in their strong ability of spreading hoaxes, false news and rumours, biased
interpretations [84]. Moreover, people seem to avoid exclusion by polarizing their perspective against a contrary one,
and joining other people who accept their views in echo chambers [85-86], again following cognitive dissonance [87],
self serving bias [88] and confirmation bias [89]. Transparency deals therefore with access to information and its
soundness. Considering access to information a service, we may think of the absence of transparency as a negative
service, and identify in groups negative levels of transparency. A participant having access to most of the information
may be set to a null value, and the other participants would have diminishing degrees of transparency, therefore
negative values, like what happens with citizens living in a centralized, non-transparent government structure.
An important difference is the one between transparency and cheating or corruption. The presence of transparency
may inhibit corruption and cheating and vice versa, but the two may live side by side. Comparing a public good game,
the network of corporate control [90] and a trivial dictatorship, we can have highest level of transparency but no
means to stop the evident and ongoing corruption and cheating.

The indexes are: Open Budget, Absence of Corruption, Bribery rate, World Press Freedom Index, etc. Without access
to good sources of information, cooperation is inhibited as people cannot understand each other and their possibility
of coordination is very low. All these indexes indicate how much access to good information is available to the citizens.

6 FREEDOM: access to services, choice. Real benefit.

The aspects of freedom in game theory experimentations are low. The main insight is relative to communication, and
derived decision making. When freedom of communication is allowed, people tend to talk and cooperation tends to
raise [91], while the presence of coercitive systems makes people dependent on sanctions or on extrinsic motivations
[50]. As soon as the punishment system is removed, people free ride: the pressure they suffered wasnt their choice
and now they need to re-balance their inner sense of justice and adhere back again to their personalities. A common
finding [44;91-92] is that freedom to communicate enhances the likelihood of cooperation in the Prisoner's Dilemma
Game. In public good games, allowing people to choose the type of redistribution system may lead to highest levels
of cooperation [93]. The freedom to abstain from a damaging game, like in the dormant players experimentation, is
also relative to the freedom dimension, as it represent an access to a service, in this case that of avoiding to play the
game [66].
In synthesis, freedom does not seem to be an easily identifiable direct determinant of cooperation in game theory, as
there is no specific service that can be identified as freedom. It seems a special service measurable in negative
values like Transparency. Inhibiting natural behavior in humans can be thought as a negative service inflicted on the
subject. Full freedom, if ever existed, would be setting that negative service to a null value. For example, in the
prisoner's dilemma game, communication is not allowed, so we have a negative service, a service that has the
effect of blocking communication. This represent a negative value in the degree of freedom of the participants.
We could be worried then about the freedom to inflict violence or other unpleasant activity onto others. This could
even be considered, as the effects of that specific free activity would represent an highly negative value in the care
dimension due to their negative effect and overall production of unbalance. If the freedom dimension would be at a
good level for one participant, that would in turn negatively affect the care level of other participant(s), affecting the
overall cooperation.

The freedom construct is measured by a number of indices such as: Civil Freedom, Civil Liberties, Political rights,
Freedom of the press, Fundamental Rights, etc. These indexes indicate the possibility for people to access different
services or rights, how much control they suffer and how much they are free to choose in their lives. Freedom creates
a context of cooperation because it allows people to follow their true nature and therefore avoid instrumental dynamics
in order to reach their happiness.

7 UNDERSTANDING: similarities in information, data and codes -

relational benefit.
Understanding relies on common codes of information interpretation. When we see, we elaborate information in a
way to have a representation of reality in our mind that is as much similar as possible to the reality around us. When
we talk with other people, communication may be foggy, and we dont understand others as we dont see things
with the same codes. Therefore cooperation with strangers is low, although empathic strangers seem to have signals
that can be interpreted in the right way by people willing to cooperate and foster cooperation. The common finding is
that perceived similarity and friendship enhance cooperation since early experimentations [94-104]. The simple
presence of human-like faces enhance trust ([105] but see [106] for face differences and preferences). Different
orientation, like the uncooperative one, tends instead to interpret altruistic signals in a different way, and avoid
cooperators. A starting non-altruist person, when meeting another similar starting non-altruist one, produced a
very high level of reciprocal altruism just because of the common trait. The same goes where similarities are found
[97;103]. For example, individuals playing iterated prisoner's dilemma game are more cooperative in presence of
someone hated by all the participants [44], the common enemy. Knowledge and common codes represent a basis
for common understanding and interact with other conditions. Among the many, the knowledge that the other has
cooperated in his past dealings with a third party: trust [107], receipt of a message indicating cooperative intent:
transparency [44], sending a message indicating that cooperation is expected: trust [44], knowledge that the other's
incentives encourage cooperation: care [108], knowledge that he has been instructed to be cooperative: understanding
[108], and knowledge that he is dependent on oneself: equivalence, care [44]. Similarities or knowledge about
diversities developed by globalization, for example, can make outgroup favoritism possible as well as integration
alliances [109].

The adopted indexes to measure understanding include: Survival rate to the last grade of primary education, both
sexes, Primary to secondary general education transition rate, Adult literacy rate, Expenditure on education,
Integration, Quality of education system, etc. Understanding each other is fundamental in cooperation as
misunderstanding may easily lead to conflicts. These indexes measure how much common and good levels of culture
are spread amongst the countries, levels which allow people to have common background when they relate to each
other.

8 DIVERSITY: personal characteristics, preferences and needs - relational

benefit/potential.
Personal and cultural preferences generate highly different behaviors. One interesting implication of this finding is
that non-cooperators often misinterpret defensive reactions to their own behavior as evidence that the other also has
non-cooperative intentions [110]. The result is the familiar self-fulfilling prophecy, which often underlies persistent
mutual non-cooperation. [See 111-112] Diversity is also responsible of ingroup and outgroup preferences, where we
have different and contrasting results about the discrepancies between expectations and behaviors, which usually lead
to conflicts [113-114], and consistent results on ingroup favoritism [113] and parochial altruism [115]. Moreover,
outside the game theory experimentations, since the Roberts-Cave experiment [116] the dynamics connected to the
simple group belonging still have a strong effect on cooperation. On the other side, at a biological level, phenotypic
diversity seems to foster cooperation instead [117], while there is a growing realization that economic models need to
consider the role of personality traits as additional explanatory variables [118-119]. Krebs has instead reviewed other
studies that suggest that the relationship between altruism and liking is a two-way street: one is more altruistic toward
those one likes (preferences, diversity) and one tends to like those who are most altruistic (e.g. [120-122]). There are
many differences on human behavior across cultures [6] as well as in antisocial punishment public good games [123].
A high variability in an individuals neighborhood promotes cooperation in networked population although medium
heterogeneity guarantees the best environment of cooperation [124]. Diversity therefore is seen as a potential: if it is
low, cooperation does not spread as no utility may come from similar beings. When it is high, it can boost conflicts if
left as crude as it is. It definitely needs a good degree of understanding, common codes or familiarity to generate
cooperation.

This construct is measured by some indexes such as: Ethnic diversity, Linguistic diversity, and Religious diversity.
These indexes measure the differences between each individual due to their native and lifelong traditions and
personality, in order to have the possibility to see how much the nation has different cultures, languages, religions and
ethnic groups. Diversity is a pre-condition and indicates a potential of conflicts and a potential of development. Which
of the two is fostered depends on the other conditions and the level of the cooperation context. It is important to
understand, therefore that high level of diversity may lead to conflicts if they are not coordinated with good levels of
equivalence, trust, care, transparency, freedom, understanding.

9 Research Method
As mentioned above, the Cooperation Context Index is made of seven constructs: equivalence, trust, care,
transparency, freedom, understanding and diversity. PLS-SEM has been chosen because CCI is a very complex higher-
order construct from statistical viewpoint, including reflective and composite constructs. The lower-order constructs
represent different perspectives of cooperation and therefore are not exchangeable. In addition, each construct is
measured by a number of reflective or composite indices. For instance, care is measured by four reflective and other
eight composite indicators. The four reflective indicators of care have established a reflective lower-order construct,
which together with other eight indicators compose the care construct. In addition to care, some of other constructs
like equivalence, transparency, freedom, and understanding are the combination of reflective and composite
indicators, whereas trust and diversity have just composite indicators. Therefore, the CCI is confirmed as a complex
higher-order construct. Indices to measure the associated constructs of the CCI were adopted in the range of 2010-
2016, from a list of major countries (more than 120), and from about 30 sources including the World Bank and World
Economic Forum.
We performed a partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) to assess the relationships between the
seven involved constructs and their associated indices, as well as the relationships between these constructs and the
CCI as a higher-order construct. Then, the score of the CCI construct has been derived for all involved countries. In
addition, one of the main objectives of this study is to calculate the CCI score, and PLS as a composite-based analysis
technique can be applied in this regard, in particular, when the composite (formative) constructs and indicators are
involved [125]. However, the framework of this study just includes a higher-order construct, and traditional PLS
algorithms need at least one endogenous construct to estimate the model [126]. To overcome this problem, the current
study applied PLS regression algorithm for outer model offered in WarpPLS 5.0 software package [127]. This outer
model algorithm instead of Mode A and Mode B algorithms [126] provides the opportunity to perform PLS without
the existence of structural model.

10 Results
We analysed the developed CCI and we calculated its score for each country based on this higher-order construct. As
a first step we established and assessed the reflective first -order constructs by assessing the reliability, and convergent
validity using composite reliability (CR) and average variance extracted (AVE). Then, we calculated the score of
reflective first order constructs using PLS regression algorithm to establish seven composite higher-order constructs
namely; equivalence, trust, care, transparency, freedom, understanding and diversity [128] (See Table 1). To assess
these higher-order composite constructs, the variance inflation factors (VIF) of indices of all involved constructs were
checked [126]. Table 1 shows that the value of VIF for all indices of composite constructs were lower than 5, the usual
threshold. Then the significance of outer weight of associate indices of seven involved constructs were checked. The
results showed the significant outer weight for all associated indices. As a second step, we used the score of these
composite higher-order constructs to establish the CCI. Table 2 shows the results of assessment of measurement model
for CCI. The value of VIF for all seven involved components to establish CCI are lower than 5 and acceptable [126].
In addition, the outer weights are significant except diversity, for which the outer loading is significant, allowing us
to retain this component. Therefore, the results show that the CCI introduced here seems to be a promising
measurement model. Then, the score of CCI was calculated for each country based on this composite higher-order
construct. Appendix 1 shows the scores of CCI and associated components including equivalence, trust, care,
transparency, freedom, understanding and diversity for involved countries.
[Table 1 about here]
[Table 2 about here]

11 Conclusion
The current study attempted to develop and validate the Cooperation Context Index as a complex composite higher-
order construct, and calculate the score of CCI of 148 involved countries in this research. The CCI and its associated
components (i.e. equivalence, trust, care, transparency, freedom, understanding and diversity), as well as associated
indices for each component were developed based on game theory and 30 international agencies indicators including
the World Bank and the World Economic Forum. The CCI included a combination of reflective and composite indices,
which we used PLS to establish and assess different levels of measurement model of CCI using PLS regression. The
common Mode A, and Mode B algorithms of outer model in PLS approach cannot be applied to establish high-order
index, and so we employed PLS regression. The use of PLS regression enhances our capability to establish a complex
higher-order construct, but this algorithm of outer model has been less employed in PLS literature and should be more
investigated in future studies. In addition, the current study has used secondary data from the data sources of
international organisations to develop and validate CCI using PLS. This type of using PLS is very rare, and to best of
our knowledge, this study is one of the first of its kind. Therefore, this can be a significant contribution to the current
PLS research and methodologies. Another significant contribution of this study is to calculate the score of CCI as a
composition of different components with different weights. To the best of our knowledge, the score of the indices
proposed so far were calculated using the average value of their associated indicators with the same weights. However,
in this study, we considered CCI as a composite construct with different weights of its associated components
(indicators), and the score of CCI was calculated by composing these components with different weights. This can be
accounted as another significant contribution of our investigation which could be applied in future studies to develop
and calculate global indices.

Acknowledgements
We wish to thank Sara Conallo for her invaluable support.

Contributors
Alessandro Merletti De Palo - Cooperation model, Systematic review, Indexes selection, Preliminary database (2015
edition)
S. Mostafa Rasoolimanesh - conceptualization of the index as a complex higher-order construct, validate the index
and calculate CCI score using PLS-SEM and WarpPLS software package
Mariangela Nitti - First draft of the partial least square model investigation
Fabio Marigo - Analysis, correction retrieval, and completion of the 2016 CCI index database
Gianna S. Monti - Abstract correction and 2016 database supervision

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Table 1: Results of Assessment of measurement model in first step

Lower Loadings
Construct Indicators level Scale Type Lower level Weights P value CR AVE VIF
indicators Indicators
Care Composite
CST 0.192 <0.01 2.55
CPW 0.167 <0.05 2.04
CHX 0.132 <0.05 1.35
CL 0.210 <0.01 2.77
CB 0.220 <0.01 4.78
CTFK 0.122 <0.1 1.57
CJUST 0.150 <0.05 1.47
CFOOD 0.154 <0.05 1.44
Care_D Reflective 0.128 <0.1 0.947 0.818 1.31
CD5 0.753
CDI 0.966
CDM 0.960
CD5
CDN 0.921
Diversity Composite
DDENDE 0.065 0.213 1.09
DETH 0.527 <0.01 1.37
DLANG 0.553 <0.01 1.40
DREL 0.235 <0.01 1.12
Equivalence Composite
ELBRW 0.091 0.130 1.02
EWLF 0.493 <0.01 2.09
EQ_Sustainability Reflective 0.498 <0.01 0.947 0.783 2.13
EFUEL 0.920
EEL 0.937
ESUST 0.708
ESAN 0.936
EW 0.901
EQ_Income Reflective 0.228 <0.01 0.958 0.885 1.05
EH10 0.955
 EL10 0.874
EGINI 0.989
Freedom Composite
Free_Finance Reflective 0.615 <0.01 0.936 0.650 1.12
FLOAN 0.785
FFIN 0.938
FFOWN 0.768
FTRD 0.679
FMKTM 0.902
FMKT 0.801
FBRD 0.578
FFINA 0.929
Free_Politics Reflective 0.615 <0.01 0.964 0.678 1.12
FSTEE 0.813
FDEMS 0.868
FPART 0.867
FRIGHTS 0.650
FCIV 0.924
FPOL 0.921
FPRESS 0.879
FNET 0.575
FDCIV 0.886
FPOLP 0.898
FD 0.636
FLAW 0.873
FM 0.817
`Transparency Composite
HB 0.308 <0.01 1.35
HGOV 0.442 <0.01 2.29
HSLEAKS 0.214 <0.01 1.16
HLEAKS 0.078 0.168 1.13
Trans._Corruption Reflective 0.401 <0.01 0.937 0.661 1.85
HWST 0.806
HFAV 0.918
 HJUD 0.904
HETH 0.937
HBRID 0.938
HCABS 0.821
HCPERC 0.482
HCBRIB 0.497
Trust Composite
TAUTH 0.450 <0.01 1.52
TBNK 0.473 <0.01 1.62
TEFF 0.351 <0.01 1.15
Table 2: Results of assessment of measurement model of CCI

Construct Indicators Weights P value VIF

CCI

Care 0.192 <0.01 3.72

Diversity 0.073 0.184 1.36

Equivalence 0.177 <0.05 2.97

Freedom 0.203 <0.01 4.91

Transparency 0.185 <0.01 2.99

Trust 0.193 <0.01 3.84

Appendix 1: The scores of Cooperation Context Index (CCI) and embedded constructs

Country CCI_2016 Care Equivalence Diversity Freedom Transparency Trust Understanding

Norway 2.037 1.188 0.537 -0.998 1.73 2.741 2.139 1.872

Finland 1.913 1.117 0.349 -0.916 1.65 1.864 2.016 2.536

New Zealand 1.854 1.364 0.36 0.134 1.691 2.882 1.888 1.505

Singapore 1.825 1.377 1.554 1.552 1.464 1.187 2.358 2.161

Switzerland 1.809 1.111 0.659 0.397 1.653 2.471 1.455 2.204

Sweden 1.786 1.196 0.465 0.005 1.54 2.551 1.71 1.822

United States 1.721 1.411 0.373 -0.302 1.544 2.522 1.203 1.774

United Kingdom 1.659 0.32 0.621 -0.579 1.524 3.654 0.757 1.589

Netherlands 1.642 1.431 0.472 -0.199 1.558 1.833 1.245 1.893

Estonia 1.633 0.83 1.877 0.15 1.821 1.283 1.753 1.045

Germany 1.597 1.785 0.439 -0.205 1.475 2.023 0.947 1.547

Denmark 1.559 1.077 0.494 -0.977 1.228 1.863 1.612 1.461

Canada 1.538 1.3 0.533 1.022 1.531 1.78 1.682 1.542

Japan 1.529 1.4 0.625 -0.817 1.416 1.522 1.004 1.659

Australia 1.524 1.531 0.355 -0.537 1.213 1.619 1.532 1.451

Czech Republic 1.506 1.264 2.272 -0.838 1.531 0.846 1.197 0.514

Taiwan 1.5 0.168 2.922 0.327 1.905 0.161 1.677 1.184

Chile 1.321 1.229 0.91 -1.224 1.462 1.103 1.397 0.321

Belgium 1.286 0.883 0.494 0.656 1.381 1.508 0.791 1.851

United Arab 1.235 0.663 1.401 0.705 0.621 0.608 1.768 1.68
Emirates
France 1.232 1.039 0.516 -0.445 1.154 2.104 0.376 1.081

Costa Rica 1.193 1.215 1.005 -1.223 0.836 0.666 1.283 0.773

Luxembourg 1.185 0.706 0.428 0.901 1.888 0.709 1.365 1.322

Poland 1.173 0.584 1.739 -1.301 1.232 0.866 1.015 0.262

Hong Kong 1.158 0.78 0.23 0.338 1.544 1.087 1.2 1.249

South Korea 1.135 1.432 1.427 -0.724 0.464 1.203 0.281 0.935

Qatar 1.128 0.229 1.112 1.373 0.806 -0.221 2.348 2.086

Austria 1.074 0.984 0.252 -0.835 1.197 1.167 0.483 1.151

Uruguay 1.01 1.09 1.238 -0.716 1.09 0.962 0.848 -0.169

Ireland 0.985 0.787 0.5 -1.077 1.186 0.655 0.011 1.534

Malaysia 0.976 0.343 0.834 1.083 1.006 -0.11 1.539 1.826

Iceland 0.92 0.713 0.556 -1.417 0.505 0.448 0.437 1.582

Slovakia 0.891 0.813 1.661 -0.697 1.171 -0.309 1.091 -0.005

Lithuania 0.884 0.611 1.488 -0.521 0.939 -0.155 0.549 1.002

Slovenia 0.789 0.865 2.018 -0.752 0.32 0.454 -0.45 0.754

Malta 0.763 0.867 0.405 -1.151 0.934 0.024 0.614 0.649

Portugal 0.713 1.006 0.378 -1.311 0.669 0.838 -0.649 0.974

Latvia 0.686 0.393 1.315 0.724 1.107 -0.085 0.712 0.425

Israel 0.581 0.457 0.264 0.274 0.241 0.139 0.792 1.212

Mauritius 0.553 0.157 0.979 0.495 1.041 -0.033 0.904 0.03

Romania 0.535 0.678 1.183 -1.117 0.364 0.175 -0.058 0.096

South Africa 0.524 0.032 -0.286 0.626 1.213 0.948 1.234 -0.232

Croatia 0.498 0.612 1.458 -0.91 0.308 -0.037 0.171 -0.166

Brazil 0.49 0.529 0.456 -0.89 0.605 0.161 1.154 -0.676

Bahrain 0.454 0.589 0.743 0.572 -0.067 0.293 0.44 0.637

Macedonia 0.385 1.03 0.648 0.296 0.219 -0.154 0.256 0.15

Panama 0.373 0.294 0.005 -0.532 1.062 -0.17 0.378 0.099

Jordan 0.368 0.917 0.25 -0.585 -0.374 -0.127 0.555 0.497

Spain 0.368 0.818 0.339 0.536 0.402 0.573 -0.299 0.307

Turkey 0.332 0.428 0.782 -0.692 0.342 -0.439 0.518 -0.138

Italy 0.313 0.848 0.195 -0.261 0.177 0.94 -0.723 0.134

Cyprus 0.304 0.573 0.475 -0.462 0.558 -0.025 -1.019 0.837

Hungary 0.299 0.352 1.501 -1.08 0.299 -0.38 -0.627 0.088

Montenegro 0.279 0.432 1.018 -0.103 0.25 -0.133 -0.149 0.055

Saudi Arabia 0.245 0.446 0.324 -0.213 -0.702 -0.17 0.898 0.445

Mexico 0.224 0.498 0.112 -0.956 -0.049 0.091 0.31 -0.142

Bulgaria 0.219 0.493 0.941 -0.64 0.312 -0.139 -0.335 -0.317

Thailand 0.206 0.55 0.497 0.16 -0.241 -0.488 0.605 0.238

Georgia 0.201 0.624 0.048 -0.075 0.175 0.917 -0.029 -0.669

Colombia 0.189 0.563 -0.093 -0.896 -0.06 -0.132 0.659 -0.298

Indonesia 0.156 -0.547 -0.046 0.841 0.428 0.23 0.309 0.714

El Salvador 0.13 0.536 0.091 -1.23 0.142 -0.397 0.458 -0.624

Jamaica 0.115 0.19 0.122 -0.973 0.539 -0.391 -0.061 -0.204

Philippines 0.11 -0.482 -0.039 1.95 0.449 0.092 0.837 0.414

Oman 0.104 0.528 0.699 0.317 -0.696 0.183 0.457 -0.396

Seychelles 0.103 0.35 0.113 -1.07 0.095 -0.066 -0.252 -0.104

Botswana 0.099 -0.242 0.023 0.089 0.533 0.2 0.576 -0.553

Bermuda 0.088 0.221 0.079 -0.449 0.06 -0.045 0 -0.024

Peru 0.079 0.373 -0.077 -0.395 0.253 0.076 0.53 -0.89

Trinidad and 0.069 0.351 0.272 0.668 0.178 -0.639 0.162 0.268
Tobago
Sri Lanka 0.062 0.324 0.153 -0.026 -0.29 -0.347 0.182 0.3

Armenia 0.036 0.548 0.641 -1.296 -0.5 -0.208 -0.392 -0.309

Guyana -0.01 -0.063 0.187 -0.44 0.044 -0.34 -0.111 0.061

Kazakhstan -0.056 0.551 0.947 0.681 -0.787 -0.519 -0.262 0.138

Kuwait -0.079 0.379 0.749 0.617 -0.972 -0.028 0.288 -0.466

Greece -0.08 0.299 0.262 -1.059 -0.203 -0.06 -1.15 0.071

Argentina -0.087 0.381 0.375 -0.929 -0.662 -0.139 -0.398 -0.289

Serbia -0.103 0.396 1.158 -0.145 -0.187 -0.731 -0.686 -0.451

Albania -0.107 0.323 0.586 -0.211 -0.537 -0.626 -0.269 -0.056

Rwanda -0.112 -0.899 -0.408 -1.29 -0.476 0.555 0.11 0.055

Cape Verde -0.128 0.138 -0.223 -0.348 0.152 -0.049 -0.471 -0.362

Namibia -0.134 -0.259 -0.647 1.268 0.602 -0.142 0.559 -0.411

Honduras -0.18 -0.064 -0.798 -1.128 -0.017 -0.712 0.236 -0.098

China -0.185 0.17 0.015 0.205 -0.956 -0.689 0.033 0.558

Tunisia -0.197 0.469 0.491 -1.518 -0.484 -0.389 -1.227 -0.394

Ecuador -0.214 -0.136 -0.037 -0.813 -0.714 -0.482 0.102 -0.132

Dominican -0.229 0.377 -0.452 -1.001 0.041 -0.595 -0.047 -0.932

Republic
Azerbaijan -0.269 0.145 0.657 -0.544 -1.142 -0.018 -0.843 -0.277

Russia -0.289 -0.224 0.272 -0.364 -1.098 -0.039 -0.658 0.187

Ukraine -0.291 0.351 0.957 -0.155 -0.743 -0.59 -1.853 0.402

Mongolia -0.312 0.152 0.003 -0.506 -0.263 -0.831 -0.895 0.006

Lebanon -0.33 0.308 0.221 -0.616 -0.486 -1.635 -0.408 0.032

Ghana -0.363 -0.644 -0.485 1.373 0.433 -0.186 -0.097 -0.452

Moldova -0.386 0.478 0.319 -0.46 -0.466 -0.646 -1.096 -0.72

Bhutan -0.392 -0.529 -0.351 0.854 -0.426 0.267 0.083 -0.735

Senegal -0.393 -0.306 -0.76 0.834 0.11 -0.438 -0.147 -0.264

Paraguay -0.399 0.482 -0.369 -0.784 -0.108 -0.622 -0.185 -1.576

India -0.401 -2.405 -0.402 0.743 0.59 0.387 -0.029 -0.002

Bosnia and -0.409 0.665 0.361 0.619 -0.773 -0.442 -0.96 -0.662
Herzegovina
Morocco -0.425 -0.179 -0.278 -0.703 -0.697 -0.425 -0.239 -0.639

Guatemala -0.426 -0.583 -0.77 0.414 0.085 -0.838 0.521 -0.563

Tajikistan -0.444 -0.21 -0.363 -0.826 -1.108 -0.349 -0.548 -0.023

Swaziland -0.514 -0.51 -0.794 -0.918 -0.544 -0.261 0.089 -1.019

Equatorial Guinea -0.52 -0.915 -0.411 -0.609 -0.557 -0.919 0 -0.168

Vietnam -0.538 0.423 0.557 0.124 -1.357 -1.278 -0.957 -0.058

Gambia -0.551 -0.869 -0.566 0.909 -0.456 0 0.007 -0.643

Kyrgyzstan -0.565 0.331 0.439 0.102 -0.833 -0.734 -1.189 -0.83

Zambia -0.593 -0.834 -1.381 0.003 0.111 -0.691 -0.199 -0.229

Nicaragua -0.626 0.335 -0.585 -0.852 -0.746 -1.089 -0.139 -1.363

Kenya -0.683 -0.78 -1.408 2.763 -0.031 -0.506 -0.038 0.128

Papua New Guinea -0.69 -1.368 -1.755 0.347 0 0.038 -0.327 -0.18

Gabon -0.696 -0.193 -0.131 0.539 -0.801 -0.263 -0.631 -1.334

Algeria -0.778 -0.062 0.172 -0.863 -1.327 -0.808 -1.268 -0.994

Bolivia -0.789 -0.66 -0.492 0.535 -0.342 -1.48 -0.316 -0.673

Niger -0.79 -1.412 -1.686 0.163 0.013 -0.679 0.05 -0.487

Malawi -0.891 -0.719 -1.191 1.565 -0.239 -0.385 -0.316 -1.252

Egypt -0.903 -0.561 -0.386 -0.558 -1.358 -1.126 -0.096 -1.342

Liberia -0.935 -0.673 -1.485 0.416 -0.277 -0.574 -0.624 -1.165

Lesotho -0.96 -0.916 -1.561 -1.025 -0.497 -0.071 -1.864 -0.552

Lao PDR -0.971 -1.768 -0.886 0.527 -1.063 -0.103 -0.438 -0.591

Venezuela -0.991 -0.207 0.229 -0.882 -1.868 -1.519 -1.1 -0.931

Benin -1.034 -1.082 -0.992 0.913 -0.467 -0.355 -0.918 -1.251

Ivory Coast -1.079 -1.039 -1.767 1.764 -0.637 -0.666 -0.603 -0.35

Uganda -1.099 -0.897 -0.769 4.086 -0.31 -0.96 -0.438 -0.847

Iran -1.106 0.62 -0.541 0.604 -2.24 -0.909 -1.88 -0.498

Tanzania -1.113 -1.137 -1.459 0.646 -0.482 -0.624 -0.871 -1.052

Bangladesh -1.204 -1.647 -0.536 -0.53 -0.751 -0.804 -1.614 -1.11

Mali -1.253 -1.439 -1.454 0.951 -0.841 -0.283 -0.992 -1.193

Eritrea -1.27 -1.937 -2.086 0.568 -1.459 0.028 -0.799 -0.216

Mozambique -1.3 -1.161 -1.738 0.897 -0.687 -0.691 -0.813 -1.419

Cambodia -1.318 -0.952 -1.249 -1.194 -1.043 -2.098 -1.016 -1.041

Somalia -1.35 -2.715 -2.58 -0.742 -1.148 -0.079 -0.893 -0.035

Pakistan -1.403 -2.227 -0.688 1.127 -1.22 -0.826 -1.182 -0.726

Nepal -1.413 -1.52 -1.062 1.955 -0.986 -0.811 -1.385 -0.876

Afghanistan -1.44 -2.674 -2.063 1.014 -0.968 -0.648 -0.728 -0.158

Cameroon -1.441 -1.4 -1.004 2.5 -1.288 -1.362 -1.009 -0.523

Ethiopia -1.493 -2.144 -1.044 1.572 -1.716 -0.805 -0.753 -0.703

Sierra Leone -1.561 -1.4 -1.716 1.12 -0.616 -1.218 -1.172 -1.676

Burundi -1.576 -1.769 -0.941 -1.259 -1.827 -0.349 -2.038 -1.685

Madagascar -1.587 -1.669 -1.754 2.028 -1.313 -0.92 -0.929 -0.974

Zimbabwe -1.605 -1.182 -1.643 -0.158 -1.595 -1.92 -1.57 -0.593

Nigeria -1.622 -2.787 -1.159 2.199 -0.701 -1.485 -0.428 -1.129

Guinea -1.624 -1.546 -1.027 0.734 -1.359 -0.572 -1.551 -2.08

Haiti -1.645 -1.289 -2.138 -1.232 -1.775 -0.433 -1.629 -1.793

Mauritania -1.779 -1.27 -1.229 -0.567 -1.826 -0.568 -2.261 -2.262

Burma (Myanmar) -2.177 -1.065 -1.76 0.613 -2.293 -2.368 -1.88 -1.771

Chad -2.565 -2.047 -2.179 2.761 -2.345 -1.297 -2.268 -2.179

ANNEX 1: Theoretical discussion
The trends in game theory and in the semantic approach to human language about interaction related words are of
course approximations. We seek rewards according to our characteristics as functionalities of the natural selection
mechanics. We seek effects. Diversity seeks care. To get these effects, not considering others is definitely an obsolete
strategy, more than that, it does not even seem to be human. Systemic balance is needed to let even the most egoist
individual happy. Egoism is linear. Even more, we call selfishness what is linear action instead. Paradoxically, self-
damaging altruists are linear actors as well. Higher awareness usually conveys more complex and systemic action
which is usually more cooperative and, after all, brings more advantages to the subject. To be more selfish, we should
be more cooperative.
Diversity of preferences need care, and care is therefore followed by equivalence, where goods and effects are
proportional to the characteristics. To match our diversity with the desired effects we need to be free to get them.
Diversity, through freedom and equivalence, receives care. In order to make this happen we need to consider the other
than the self. We need awareness, that is, information about what surrounds us, and about the other agents around us.
Transparency. With information, we start to understand what is similar to us or what is similar to what our
characteristics need. Having others in the context who are looking for the same effects, we need to coordinate, or we
could clash and hurt each other, which is what we do not need, what our characteristics do not want. Finally, in order
to coordinate the different diversities, we need a prediction security that everything will be proportional and equivalent
to our characteristics. We need the (social) eco-system to warrant a high probability of delivering the effects the
kaleidoscopic collection of free individuals desire, without disrupting the ecosystem itself. Trust. Diversity should
trust that, through freedom, transparency, understanding an equivalence, care for the same diversity will be assured.
Thats the secret we see behind human cooperation. Aware coordination of diversity. We could have chosen less
conditions, like coordination (diversity, freedom, equivalence), awareness (transparency, understanding, trust) and
happiness (care). Someone else would have divided the condition differently: information (transparency,
understanding), advantages (equivalence, care), anarchy (freedom and diversity) and faith (trust). We choose these
conditions instead, in a progressive process and setup, hoping they will represent a better map than other
differentiation. Again, this is a model. Possibly useful, surely not the reality.

Intrinsic or extrinsic trust

Trust (both in its affective and accountability-wise aspects), as already exposed, is based on the evaluation of current
information and memories of past interaction in order to decide whether to invest in the possible reciprocal agreements
and projectualities with other individuals in the future. Trust is our predictive system when we decide whether to
invest or not in an action with another individual. When we decide on our own, according to our preference curves,
the motivation that lies under our level of trust is intrinsic, while when we decide because of an external reward, like
money or reputation, or because of the risk of a punishment or a retaliation, the motivation is extrinsic [129-130].
We can therefore observe an action according to extrinsic or intrinsic motivations, instrumental vs. non instrumental
action, pleasurable action or not.

Action Motivation Pleasure

You want a cake, you make it, you like making it. Extrinsic, instrumental Yes

You want a cake, you dont want but force yourself making it. Extrinsic, instrumental No

You enjoy to make a cake and you do it Intrinsic Yes

You inflict yourself to eat a bad cake (self-destructive drive) Intrinsic No

Extrinsic means we are trying to get a reward or an output of a function through another passage or instrumental
process that we associate as means to get the same reward/output, but that passage is not the real output/reward. It
can be disconnected to our preferences, as we dont like the passage, but accept it in order to acquire the output. It can
be pleasurable, but being instrumental we could end up hating it, like loving to make cakes and to make our family
happy, but hating to make cakes for the whole family everyday.
The four behaviors can be forced or influenced through corruption or rewards. In that case:

Manipulated Action = You are forced or corrupted to.. Motivation Pleasure

..make a cake by your dad but you like doing it Extrinsic, Yes
instrumental

..make a cake by your dad but you dont like doing it (slavery) Extrinsic, No
instrumental

..eat the cake you like by your dad Extrinsic, Yes??

instrumental

..eat a cake you dont like by your dad (punishment, sadism) Extrinsic, No
instrumental

The extrinsic motivation could be represented by avoiding the punishment or getting the reward. But what happens
when we are the subjects who want our same dismay?

Action Motivation Pleasure

You force yourself with no apparent reason to make a cake even if you Intrinsic? No
dont like making cakes self punsihment?

You find yourself making cakes even if you dont like making cakes Intrinsic No
self negation
self destruction
identity denial

These two last actions represent very strong examples in which we may recognize strange episodes happened in our
lives. We find ourself working in a company role we dont like, or doing a job we hate. So, whats happening in those
cases? Our simple preference curve has been so much distorted by ecosystemic-social pressure and extrinsic
motivations that we get used to deny our identity. The passage do your job, to get the money becomes through
distortion so connected with buy with money what you like that we dont recognize the output anymore, and think
the passage is the output instead. This passage could be described as a transposition or as a metonymy. So we just
make money even if we dont like making it, and could even start disliking the idea of buying what we wanted and
just get pleasure in accumulating money!
Ferguson and Corr [131] use the blood donors example to point out that cooperation without punishment is possible
and happens in real life. The intrinsic motivation even makes people not to talk about their donor activities, suggesting
a complete absence of reputation-based motivation [132], and they decide to donate independently by other donor
friends [133] due to a feeling of warm glow ([134]: Andreoni cites the same idea of the glow in Arrow, Sen,
Collard, Roberts, Lucas and Stark, Sugden, Margolis, Prosnett and Sander during an arch of time from mid seventies
to mid eighties).
We are observing everything from the proximate level of psychological altruism. What is that warm glow?
Nobody forces people to donate blood, nobody forces people to act or be happy for the fortune-of-others [135]. At
a more ultimate cause level, nobody forces a child to trust the parents, and in this case we know there are strong genetic
forces behind, like that of kin, but ultimately nobodys forcing anybody to trust beloved non-relative friendships (but
see the propinquity effect in [136] afterwards confuted in [137]). Andreoni in 1990 explains it as a case of impure
altruism, where people like to be altruist, as they have a personal utility in it. Again we see that selfishness and
altruism are just part of the same phenomenon, and that only preferences, nuances, individual colors shape individual
actions.
We are, nevertheless, vehicles for the genes, so where did this like about being altruist come from? How is it
possible that humans may fight and get far from their brothers and sisters but donate blood to strangers? Is that warm
blow a stretched parental care devoted to the neighbour? Is that a simulation, or a training for parental care? Is that
the more complex effect of many independent but coordinated genetic drives? Independently of how many possible
concurring causes, this seems to be the complex answer coming from a complex awareness. The awareness of a
complex system in which helping others or helping oneself may overlap: the resulting response of a system of genes
generates a proportional behavior that is made of what we call altruism and selfish preference to help others. The
more the system of genes is aware of the complexity, the more proportional and balanced would be the resulting
phenotypic action: it seems the fruit of a systemic awareness, or of a genetic functionalities network. When this
systemic awareness we could be born with [138] is biased by extrinsic motivations due to punishment or corruptive
behaviors, or when a culture of systemic awareness is not introduced, the individuals start misfiring and their actions
become distorted.
It seems like punishment blocks the way to a deeper awareness because it simplifies the complex calculations our
probability system is doing. We are evaluating whether we should trust and expect a good outcome when suddenly
the punishment brings the evaluation abruptly down. Punishment and simple rewards seem to be, in a complex system
organizational perspective, a quick fix [139] Yes, they do work. But for how long? Many scholars (see for example
[140]) effectively found that costly punishments (and rewards) were more effective at encouraging cooperation, but
do they last in the long term, and how?
The study of cooperative behaviors in communities, companies and governmental relations by Tyler [141] is quite
effective in this. The role of more complex social motivations, instead of punishments and rewards, could lead to a
more effective systemic awareness and therefore systemic change.
In the same Pruitt and Kimmel [4], we find an important suggestion on the possibility to have better results
experimenting with different payoffs and even non-numeric ones. This is due to the fact that complex human
preferences are usefully simplified by the monetary benefit quantification. The plasticity of money to be transformed
into what is needed by the subject is very useful in game theory, but the same quantitative simplifications lack attention
to the irrational and relational aspects which affect daily human decisions. Rewards and punishments, or negative
feedbacks, are based on personal preferences evaluations but of course these preferences are based on previous or
concurrent external and contextual stimuli too, therefore it is difficult to even establish a difference between intrinsic
and extrinsic motivations.
A good determinant could be the amount of systemic, impersonal, quantitative, discrete and real advantage (vs.
disadvantage) like money/food, services, useful information, and on the other side the more complex, say irrational,
qualitative, continuously updated amount of personal, interaction-based, relational pleasure (vs. discomfort)
derivable from a choice.
These relational advantages can be viewed in a complex and systemic way, and be observed by a rational actor model
perspective only when integrated with a biological evolutive perspective. The evolution process developed neural
circuits, endocrine fluctuations, bacterial resident fauna or, in one word, a complex system that is typically human,
able to evaluate an immense number of preferences functions, enacted contemporarily, and generated consistently
considering environment and time. This is pretty much what a computer or a modern phone does, but in our case, the
human behavior case, the complexity level reached is still not in the range of current scientific knowledge or computer
calculation. This is the realm of complex systems, fuzzy logic and multiple perspective approaches. These approaches
are more proportional, probabilistic, chaotic than precise, exact, predictable ones.

Punishment and rewards

Real or relational, advantages represent rewards. Our genes seek for rewards in order to survive or replicate as genes.
They, again, dont do it for a purpose, but because other genes who didnt care about survival simply are not here
anymore. The main point with punishments and rewards is they represent information. They tell whether something
is functional or not. Sometimes, like in the case of carbs, they misfire and cant recognize when its too much. In any
case, punishments and rewards, advantages and disadvantages alter our expectations and predictive ability. Social
motivations are special complex rewards we receive when acting in a way that helps the whole system. Unfortunately,
social motivations are usually substituted by bare punishments or rewarding privileges for who behaves correctly and
aligns to current social norms and social pressures. When we base our societies on punishment, we should at least
make those punishments progressive [35], consistent, coming from procedural justice and certain [141]. In other
words, just and trustful.
Current competitive system made us to not always trust others. When we dont trust others, we try to control them.
The alternative way to direct control is indirect control, like in modern slavery or manipulation: again, psychological
punishment and rewards. If social norms represent a form of societal control, they may lead to punishing who has
characteristics that differ too much from the standard. Imagine a naked indian yogi living in last century Japan, or any
contemporary queer identity supporter in the western 20s.
Punishment is nothing more than a negative feedback about an action. In this respect, we could even enter the realm
of information. It is something happening after and if an event or a behavior happens. As punishment is a negative
reinforcement, a reward is a positive one. The term punishment, in human language, includes some sort of revenge
idea, and the punished is given the attribute of guilty. Punishment is different than casual damage, pain, loss or other
negative events caused by an action of the subject. In those cases the disadvantage is not executed by another
individual, the negative psychological effect is not provided. In fact if we cut ourselves while using a knife, we
consider it as a mistake. Nevertheless, at a neurological level, pain or dislike are information about something that is
contrary to our nature. In any case, punishment as negative feedback of an anti-social behavior is part of our society.
Instead of setting up the stage for a deep explanation of the evolution of punishment, or the evolution of strong
reciprocity and strong punishments coming from capital execution in ancient tribes ([142] and commentary), it seems
more interesting to focus on what the punishment represents: information. Violence in fact differs from punishment
because it hasnt the causal information of the punishment. In punishment there is a will and the punished has a guilt
that usually carries a motivation known by the punished. The social punishment has a declared cause about why the
subject is punished. Violence, in some sense, is gratuitous. Punishment could represent a negative service inflicted on
the individual, with an informative purpose: if you do that, it will harm your society and your group as a whole, so I
make you suffer to bind a negative message with that action. If I punish you verbally or marginalizing you, you
suffer a social pressure to align to the social norms. Social isolation may trigger very intense depression and at a
physiological level strong cortisol response that in turn trigger other kind of unbalances.
A punishment is set in a social system or in an interaction in order to have some intended result, forcing the participants
with a threat. The concept of shadow of the future [42] and of the strong reciprocity in Gintis, Bowles, Fehr and others
are based on punishment. The word punishment is more related to a norm. Without a specific event and punisher there
is no punishment. Sometimes instead norms are favored with rewards, suggesting social systems could be built on
those rather than on punishments. What is punishment, if not a negative reward? What is reward, if not a positive
punishment? The debate between punishments and rewards is still ongoing because the former ones seem to be
remembered more due to a cognitive bias that makes us remember more a loss or a pain rather than a win or a pleasure
(loss aversion [143]; negative bias [144]). The easy idea that a punishment is the same as a reward from a mathematical
point of view seems therefore flawed, as 1 unit of punishment seems to be exchanged at, lets say, 1:5 with the rewards.
Nevertheless, this relation can be fixed and we could imagine equivalent effects. If this imaginary market works, there
would be no difference between rewards and punishment: getting a -5 is pretty similar to missing a +25. These simple
assumptions unfortunately face the complexity of human diversity and the different ways everyone of us perceive a
punishment or a reward and their relative amounts, and while sometimes they have effectively a similar effect on
cooperation [140], a combination of the two seems to be, for some scholars, the best cocktail to induce cooperation
[145].
Norms and their relative punishment are effective in making an economic system work [146]; but see [147], a political
system be more efficient [148] and a good rule of law index in nations is associated with high GDP per capita [123].
Nevertheless, Sitkin and Bies [149] are inline with Ostrom when indicating that a legal system of control (=punishment
system) creates second, third, nth order dilemmas, paradoxically intoxicating what needs to receive care. The same
damaging effects on trust are experienced with the presence of contracts [150]. The presence of a sanctioning system
could even make people dependent on sanctions [50]. Retaliation by strong cheaters through antisocial
punishment could even affect more the panorama [151-153] ). Punishment intensity, moreover, varies from culture
to culture. The amount of capital execution in hunter-gatherers against cheating and selfish individual behaviour seems
to be high [154]), although not very high in foragers due to the revenge applied to the executions. Again, strong
cheaters punish those who punish. In a tribal example of communal execution, it is clear that the point of everybody
participating is to avoid retaliation by making it impossible to determine who actually killed the culprit, a highly
efficient punishment system [155], but always in the realm of a strong quick fix.
As weve seen, many scholars find out that punishment or sanctions, and monetary rewards, while useful for fostering
temporary cooperation (like in Gintis and colleagues, although see [151-153]) are detrimental for intrinsic cooperation
and trust and change the level of choice from a personal ethical or spontaneous pleasure to an instrumental strategic
calculation, with confirmation both from game theory based laboratory experiments and field studies [4;45-55;57;149-
150;156-164]. When we punish, we leave the social reasoning, or systemic awareness, and simplify to the strategic
reasoning typical of -no judgement intended- monkeys [138], and we enter into its idiocy [165].
The problem with punishment, other than antisocial punishment or retaliation, is therefore that people become
dependent to -or are transformed by- sanctions. Scholars argue that when participants decide their own sanctions, this
change wont happen [58;35], probably because they make intrinsic something that is generally extrinsic. Will this,
in the long run, effectively be the case? Effectively, recognizing oneself in those rules is fundamental. Recognizing
the self in others may be a stronger drive to cooperation than punishment, like in the case of onymity [166]. Even if
we know that Ostrom field observations and conclusions are relative to communities across centuries and generations
and that the effect on contribution to the public good was effective, we dont know if the contribution was intrinsic
motivated or instrumental. In simple words, we know its better when people agree on their sanctions, but we dont
know if the problem of extrinsic motivation is solved. Once the gradual sanctioning system is put away, will people
still contribute to the public good? Instead of punishment, can simple information about a system damaging behavior
be enough for an individual to avoid exploitation or error?
When punishment is not distributed, but centralized, the cost of monitoring and sanctioning is quite high [35]. These
two aspects seem to point out that individuals need to retain their identity and not follow a ready made rule, even if
the rule is useful. They need to recognize themselves in the sanction, if any sanction should be instituted. Tyler concept
of procedural justice is quite effective in this perspective. People prefer to renounce to a reward -or to face a
disadvantage or a punishment- when they understand and believe in that result just like as a father likes to renounce
to his own food for nurturing his children [141].
The choice of a restriction or a sanctioning system is an output a group selects coming from a process of elaboration
of experiences. It cannot be transferred as ready made. Without the process of understanding, and having common
codes of interpretation, a norm is not integrated in the self, and is therefore rejected internally even when it is followed
due to extrinsic incentives, threats or motivations. When instead people see why something is a common agreement,
and a decision born out from the evaluation of personal experiences, they develop an attitude to cooperate more with
the agreement itself. The same happens when the possibility of modifying the decision taken is possible, once
understood the effects [4]. This has to do with the learning process that is unique to everyone of us. Forcing the process
brings anger and inhibiting it with punishments could be a quick fix but it can be detrimental in the long run. This is
the fundamental difference between rules and agreements.
To add another level of complexity, the fake threat of punishment could be used to obtain selfish advantages. Again
we see how mixed trust is, based on effects -real damage- or on threats -information-. While effects are part of the
present, and substantially real, information is a physical complex process that enacts fuzzy probabilistic states of mind
corresponding to degrees of certainty, or maybe trust. Information is not the real effect or thing, it is just an
informatic pointer to them, a reference, a representation. Of course, emotive punishment through painful
communication, like in vituperation, lies on the border.

Reputation, gossip
A very light or weak form of punishment is that of reputation. Punishment sometimes is not strong, but weak,
and a bad reputation is sometimes seen as a non-harmful form of punishment [142;162;167-169]. Unfortunately social
sanctions represent a marginalizing threat [141]. Reputation-driven or social exclusion and marginalization, as we
have seen at a genetic level before, could have dramatic effects on individuals and personal perception of the self: the
crucial device for controlling free-riding in humans is an evolved disposition to suffer severely from awareness that
one is widely perceived as normatively deviant. [170]. The results at the social and psychological level may be highly
detrimental as well and represent neurophysiological social pain [171]. If we add the common possibility of strategic
diffusion of false reputation the weak punishment system fails again in its premises [74]
Social judgements, moreover, vary according to culture and its taboos. In every group, as in our world, theres not
only one social punishment, theres not only one kind of action to be socially prosecuted and the social punishment
system varies according to the subgroup, being the parent group the world, a country or local traditions-based
communities. We can speculate the social norms clash one another with undesired results, pretty much like standard
ones [147] Moreover, the contextual side effects of social and ordinary norms and punishments may trigger ecological
long term costs, with group or systemic damage, like in the case of desperados and their reaction to the same system
[172].
Reputation is in any case useful to see how standard and social punishment are a clumsy way to vehiculate information.
When we act as physical punishers we want someone to act in some way. We want it right away, so we just dont ask
them to act the way wed like, we just hit. We also want the person to learn the lesson, but we do not teach, we hit and
rely to the negative bias of the persons memory. Again, shadow of the future, fear, distrust. The step from hitting to
communicating a bad reputation, judging, insulting or excluding is quite a small one, it lowers the personal costs of
the punisher and, thanks to our psychological mechanisms, is quite effective. But is the information transferred? And
does the other person want to learn, hear or align to what the information would communicate? Is it a commune-
cation?
The trivial tune behind all this is a tongue twister: if fear is the opposite of trust, why should I foster trust with fear?
When we use the instrument of punishment, as well as bad reputation, were using fear to fight fear. We actually
generate fear to fight fear. Trust fostered through distrust. It really appears like a quick fix, not a profound and systemic
solution.
When we are forced into a behavior with fear, we just avoid the threat, but in the long run we get far from our identity
and our ability to recognize and understand the environment and the context, due to oversimplification: we fear just
the punishment, we dont cope with complexity.
We use energy and fatigue to face stress, context distortion, isolation and absence of profound, truthful relationships
between individuals, social groups and the environment. We can thus enter a vicious cycle in which denial of our own
spirit and desires create a distance between us and our natural personality, which alternatively splits and alters our
perceptions and thoughts.
We ask our first personality -and perceptions, and thoughts- to wait, while, because of fear, we give power and control
to a second one, who has different tastes and preferences. The preferences we are forced to through punishment,
judgement, social pressure.
When this cycle gets its momentum, recognizing which identity is the right one gets more and more difficult for the
conscious mind, and while one identity goes ahead the original one is figuratively dragged to keep the two proceeding
together, while the subconscious, to whom the entire scene is clear and visible before its eyes, suffers everyday
imperceptibly.
Negation, removal, false identities, dual (when not n-tuple) personalities are triggered, together with opportunism,
lying, instrumental collusions, extrinsic incentive-based actions. Again, individual diversity and natural tendencies
are distorted, theres no time to make mistakes, to learn and grow for our natural self, and pathologies arise.
The self could protect itself with cognitive dissonance, self serving bias and confirmation bias in order to be consistent
in its identity, personality, behaviors and beliefs. Something happens inside of us for the survival of our diversity. A
whole system is activated in order not to die -or suicide- internally at the identity level, not to be excluded at the social
level, while we suffer due to the bereavement of our true but frozen self and hope for its magical return in order to end
a continuous, silent, hidden grief.
Is it therefore possible a world without sanctions? If we want a world without pain, obviously not, at least for now.
Pain and fear are at the base of our survival functionalities: we need them as information without which we could
easily die. We could, in the future, alter our nature and invent something different than pain, like bio-robotic signals,
but they would probably be slow for a quick and life-saving reaction. In any case, now our safety depends on those
negative feedback signals. According to this, someone could say we already have an internal sanctioning or
punishment-based system. Which in reality is an informative-signaling one.
The difference at a social level is how the sanction, or the signals, are perceived. When an individual mistakenly hits
a wall, a sanction informs through pain that hitting walls is not going to be a good way to enjoy your life. When we
do something against a social norm, we receive another form of sanctioning. When we eat a delicious fruit, a reward
informs through pleasure that eating delicious fruits is very good, but we suffer a marginal wealth effect if we eat too
much of them. If we eat too many, well feel sick. If we eat enough, we are satisfied, we smile. Basically, happiness
is related to equilibrium.
Our informative system, our awareness allows us to better represent the complexity around us. Awareness leads us to
balance, like when we eat good food, but not too much. But how much do we need to know?
Perfect information
Another theoretical assumption is that perfect information does not need trust. This idea that perfect information alone
can solve the problem of trust is currently quite risky as the idea behind complete information is that a human would
know everything about the other participants and how to interpret that information too, for a final rational act derived
from that interpretation [173-174]. We could think about it as avoiding the probabilistic aspect of trust, turning it into
mere determination. Interpretation differs from facts. Due to the physical transformations that trigger information, we
can probably only interpret facts, or get exposed to them, like film does. Interpretation is the way we transform
signals into representations. We can even choose between interpretations.
Having the right way or formula in order to interpret the perfect information about other participants of a group is
another level of knowledge, but we can add that to the perfect information package. The problem arises with the
time coordinate. We update our trust according to information, but being our awareness part of that information, the
loop tends to infinite. We meet, once again, the deterministic problem: is everything predictable or our awareness is
able to alter the system in an unpredictable way? In the first case, if we had perfect information, the future would be
mere calculation [175-176], with no need of trust. Probably determinism and free will are two sides of a common
whole, just like altruism and egoism.
In practical terms, we can have only partial information, and not just because we cannot obtain it, but because it would
require immense storage of data. This is true also considering the continuous interpretative process of awareness. Lets
hypothesize to have perfect information in time t0. Time t1 is when we should act basing on the right interpretation
about that information, whose source has meanwhile changed again making our information not to be perfect anymore.
The same information reception time needs a minimum, even infinitesimal amount of time, in which the perfect
information becomes old and imperfect. Apparently an identity of subject and object could determine perfect
information, but even in that case the step of becoming aware takes time, just as the time of becoming aware our feet
are getting cold.
Events are generally ruled, in usual conditions, by chaos (Lorenz [177]: what could be the Lyapunov time of a human
interaction prediction?), and participants act at least partially in an irrational way - with apparent good results [178].
Probably the idea of irrationality isnt real, its just an ever-changing context whose awareness loops makes it hard to
predict. This theoretical discussion is useful to understand factors playing in any human interaction we may analyze.
Without the proper codes of interpretation for all the participants of the interaction, predictions of future actions could
lead to uncoordinated results or to false information. Some of the participants may exploit the group through false
information or false reputation as a working mechanism to obtain pleasurable advantages -at a systemic cost.

False information
To solve the problem of false information, we should probably look at the incentives and the motivations that may
produce it. We should also make the premise that true and false are quite fuzzy concepts. They are averages. This
does not mean that a true assumption isnt real, but we need to remember that for example what was true centuries
ago is hardly true nowadays. Everything could be more or less contextual and approximate. We have quite an
untouchable approximation, though, when we say that the Sun enlightens the planet Earth. True and false are fuzzy,
but they can be 99%: there is no place for too much sophism.
Communication means to make commune. When we communicate in bona fides, we make one information commune.
This communality allows similarity, usually followed by understanding. If I dont know the meaning of cake, a
person telling me what it is can create a similarity between our mind-networks: a cake is a soft sweet, usually of
round shape, usually big as a dish and high as half a glass. When Ill see a cake, Ill probably recognize it, but even
if I dont, I can understand another person talking about a cake because I have a similar concepts in my head. Its like
as I have kept in my brain a drawing of the cake concept and I describe it to another person, which draws with
sensibility a similar drawing according to my indications.
Our senses, in this respect, continuously communicate with the external world. We make a representation in our
memory of what we perceive. We understand the world making a representation of it. The image of an apple: we
draw the apple and store it like a file. The taste of a banana. The softness of a cake. They are common codes in
human minds. One of the most widespread common code in humans is that of familiar shapes, like faces. The word
pareidolia refers to our possibility to misinterpret a casual visual stimulus, like a random image, as a face, or as a
known shape. We have a model in our mind, and we use it to interpret reality or fantasy. A hill can be seen as a face
profile or as a breast.
Information matter

Thanks to our senses we create in our minds a similar representation of the objects entities. This process isnt
something void. It is common to think about information as made of no material elements, but it is not so. Its not
something virtual and ethereal, untouchable. From a physics perspective, it is a transformation, a movement, a transfer.
When we see and recognize a lion, there is a long process happening. Over the Sun, nuclear reactions are generating
billions of photons. Many of them pass the atmosphere, reach the lion and rebound over the animal. Some of those
rebounding enter our eyes, hit the retina, the retina reacts, triggers neurological dynamics, activates our memory, the
mind recognises the lion, communicates it to our awareness and.. we usually turn and run away if were not in a zoo.
The information theres a lion at less than one kilometer from you is a chain of events, not a simple message. It is a
transformation involving energy and matter. Moreover, for this transfer, we need many transformations or movements
of matter to be able to elaborate information. It is like when a stone hits the surface of a still lake. It is like when we
throw a stone on a tree bark, and the bark remains signed by the impact. So it is our mind and our memory. The
difference is mainly the complexity and the sensitivity. Animals and humans are like film: once exposed, it transforms
itself. We are made of very sensitive and reactive film. Once exposed to light, sounds, tastes, smells and other
sensations like the tactile one, our films memorise the information, elaborate it and, like a sunflower, may decide to
act accordingly, move, react. We are, in an ideal huge loom or weave, complex twines. Complex nodes in a network,
not detached from the rest, but intertwined. When we are born, the twine of matter we are made of gets more and more
complex, the more we react to transformations. When we get old, we probably lose the momentum due to a genetic
decision, and start to end our blossoming.
If we think as humans or animals as complex nodes of matter, information could be seen as making that node more
complex maintaining entropy steady, and exporting it outside the node like living beings do.

To conclude, when we communicate we make something common. The wall is red, a simple information, is made
common telling other people in the group through symbolic sounds or repeated images, like typographic letters, called
words. Once everybody knows, we have a common information or a common code. The spread and access to
information and knowledge can reinforce understanding, trust and make possible cooperative choice easier to be taken
[1739].

Why do we use fake news then, or why do we punish? A form of pretending is spread in the animal and vegetal worlds,
like in the case of camouflage or mimicry. The difference in humans is our awareness: it makes it a voluntary,
conscious choice. Truth is very relative, especially in kids, who quickly learn to pretend, daydream, play with their
imagination to learn how to train their simulation and virtualization skills. But what do they pretend for? Probably, to
get rewards and smile. We are all kids, just seeking happiness. The more we understand how complex is the world
around us, the more we learn we need others to maintain a stable self. What we are currently missing is how to discern
between extrinsic and intrinsic motivations.
As per the system we have now, we usually fear not to receive the right amount of happiness we deserve. The more
we are aware, the more we would probably like the right amount of happiness for us and those who are around us,
because we know our happiness can improve if others are feeling good as well and help us out playing their role in
what we call the society. When we look for more happiness, its because we are used to think about scarcity, and
the possibility our happiness may end. Were afraid of bad moments, or enemies, or lack of affection. Were afraid
our ego is not important to others, we feel fear to be discredited and to become an outcast with a toxic self. So we
dont want to be excluded, abandoned or betrayed, and when somebody does it, we react, punish, signal, use reputation
and gossip ([78-81], compare with [74]) to inform our feeling of unbalance. The feeling of justice is dependent on the
level of awareness of the ecosystem, and when the awareness is high, we understand and fight also for other peoples
rights or even for other peoples reputation. We punish to maintain the fragile balance of cooperation (Gintis, Bowles,
Fehr, Boyd, Gchter, Fischbacher, Rockenbach, Richerson.. etc.). We pretend, sometimes, for the same reason. We
want our happiness and a happy world according to our awareness of the system. But when we punish, or pretend, we
are acting instrumentally or in order to gain control of another human. When we accept a job we dont like, were not
aware of the real reason. We dont choose that job because we are conscious that our role in the system will help all
of us. We usually choose that job because we are afraid not to have enough money for us, not to be allowed to use the
facilities of the system, etc. So we adapt to the situation and accept extrinsic motivations as the reason for our action.
We betray our self, and transform us in order to obtain advantages. Finally, we generate distortion inside us with
multiple personalities and generate disequilibrium in the system.
Cooperation seems therefore to be based on punishment, evolve into reputational punishment and gossip structure to
enhance cooperation and avoid cheating, even though, the risk of retaliation and false information is always at stake,
so punishment and its weak forms of reputational punishment seem to be quick fixes with polarizing reactions
[74;179]. How to avoid punishment, false reputation, endless retaliations and polarization then?
The main answer seems to be systemic thinking. Distribution of adequate personality-based rewards, that would boost
intrinsic motivations. Coordination of diversities. Adequate space for diversities, bridged through common codes.
Sound, balanced, cultural networks. Culture, science, knowledge diffusion.
Deep social awareness.

Diversity, identity, personality

Diversity in human preferences can describe why we are more prone to trust one person -the one who becomes our
friend- than another. Characteristics and preferences do influence our trust and our expectations. We are constantly
following our happiness and our happiness is bound with awareness of the ecosystem, the social and physical
environment that surrounds us. If we manage to coordinate our preferences, and satisfy them in a balanced and
enjoyable way, were on the right track to fight misinformation. Why? Because we do not need either to pretend or
to misinform. We already have what we need: a profound and proportional happiness.
It seems like scientists want to find out through game theory predictive tools about human behaviour, but so far
experimentations provided the insight that diversity and environment apply so much variation on the individual cases
that no clear common outcome has been so far produced. Nevertheless, predicting human behavior is something social
scientists seem to want to discover in order to have better societies, but probably predictable societies could result in..
boring or frustrating societies. The unpredictability of game theory and its variation according to the diversity of
context [6;123] makes social and individual human life unpredictable.. but free. The approach to policy making
should probably be more based on simple outcomes of complex structures rather than on complex outcomes of simple
structures.
The diversity aspect seems to indicate the need for space and coordination of the different personalities. Space means
a common degree of freedom in which to experiment our personality and recognize our preferences, with a growing
awareness of the system. Coordination means a balance in the possibility of action and equivalent absence of limits in
accessing contextual services. While theres no cooperation possibility when trust is absent, the coordination of self
interests could represent the solution to the circular influence between cooperation and trust. In order to coordinate
different self interests we need, of course, to take account of different personalities and innate or contextual
characteristics, as even the mere nationality influences the concept and effects of trust [180]
Conclusions: when matter plays the game of Life
In synthesis, game theory indicates lines and trends that can help us from a human perspective to understand key
factors useful for determining the presence of cooperation. Its emergence, instead, has to be found in the program of
life, that is, in the step between matter and life, information, awareness.
Matter starts to play the game of Life repeating itself with small variation. Replication with variation triggers what
humans may interpret as choice: parts of matter are choosing. When parts of matter randomly replicate and then
adapt to certain environment, we think they somehow choose where they like to be. But it is not yet like that. We
think they seem to choose when those pieces of matter survive better in waters than on sand. In a cold temperature,
or in a warm one. Fishes like water more than crocodiles. Animals like to eat while plants dont, they prefer
their green tan and drinking water from their feet.
This may seem passive to us, but what is the boundary between functionality and preference? Pandas only eat bamboo,
for example. Is that a preference? We have a preference for carbohydrates and sugars. Is that a functionality?
Sometimes its hard for us not to choose something delicious, or sweet, even if it will make us undesirably fat.
Behind preferences, behind choices, there are characteristics and functionalities. Freedom, in this sense, seems to be
related to follow our own nature.
The step forward is conscious, aware choice. Choice in humans is dependent on awareness, as we know about
ourself and we observe our preferences, and maybe, if not in a deterministic chain of events, we have a degree of
freedom to alter events. But if we skip free will, those choices are, in turn, functionalities. And even if we allow the
idea of free will, we cant deny we are strongly led by functionalities. Sometimes, our will has a hard time with
sugars, with drugs, with the mating instinct.. or with what we call affection or love. When we reach, in fact, the
dimension of emotions, affection and, in one word, relations, the functional aspects seem to disappear.
 From an economic perspective, it seems like affective services differ from standard services due to similarity,
frequency and characteristics. We find similarity when we consider Winnicotts object-relation theory [181], when
we observe relational bonds in faces (like we saw in the understanding paragraph), dolls, pets, cartoons or even books
or song characters. Those characters personality was so strong that led people to changing their name or to give the
characters name to their offspring. We save pandas but we dont save specific insects, for example, because we dont
have a strong relation with them and this is probably due to absence of similarity, preferences, familiarity.
Nevertheless, we seem to care more about dogs than monkeys, probably due to behavioral reasons: monkeys are less
social than dogs. They are more similar to us, but seen in a Winnicott perspective, they are less familiar.
If an object reminds us a moment of our life, we find it hard to separate from that object because there is something
of ourselves in it. Relational attachment could therefore be based on finding the self or the parent (genetically it is
quite similar) into the other, the non-subject, the object. Same happens with humans that do not correspond to our
characteristics-preferences. We say we have a negative relation with them. Nevertheless, sometimes, meeting the
same bad human more times lets us get accustomed to that strange individual and we could even create strong bond
with them. We learn the others codes. Frequency is usually used in marketing to transform indifference into relation.
We associate moments, memory and events to objects, songs, smells. Relation in that case is self-to-self. We spend
our lives getting aware of ourselves, recognizing ourselves in our preferences, our likes, our characteristics, our story.
We get more and more aware of ourselves. Were not born with that kind of awareness. Without culture and
knowledge, we seem more similar to other species. Without culture, knowledge and narrative we seem to be less
aware. We are less systemic-aware the more we dont have codes to interpret reality in the right way, or better, to
interpret the other than the self in the proper way.
Systemic awareness instead brings us to know about the network and its circular generation of rewards, where we can
find our preferences satisfied and our happy living space, in cooperation with other diversities. Through Equivalence,
Trust, Care, Transparency, Freedom and Understanding, systemic awareness is able to coordinate the many diversity
needs and preferences, and lead us to a world of cooperation.

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