Open AccessGames of Two Halves: Non-Experimental Evidence on Cooperation, Defection and the Prisoner’s Dilemma
Author(s) -
Stephen Dobson,
John Goddard
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
review of economic analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.101
H-Index - 1
ISSN - 1973-3909
DOI - 10.15353/rea.v10i3.1448
Subject(s) - stylized fact , prisoner's dilemma , dilemma , superrationality , psychology , social psychology , economics , microeconomics , positive economics , game theory , epistemology , keynesian economics , philosophy
We develop a stylized two-period game-theoretic model of the strategic choices made by soccer teams when selecting between defensive and attacking team formations, and between non-violent and violent styles of play. Cooperative behaviour during the early stages of matches is typically superseded by non-cooperation during the latter stages. The propensity for violent play to take place in the latter stages of soccer matches is interpreted as novel non-experimental evidence that players typically resort to mutually detrimental non-cooperative forms of behaviour when the payoffs assume a prisoner’s dilemma structure.