Defection
Book Chapter
Powers, S. T. (2017)
Defection. In Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science (1-4). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_1616-1
No abstract available.
The institutional approach for modeling the evolution of human societies
Conference Proceeding
Powers, S. (2016)
The institutional approach for modeling the evolution of human societies. In Proceedings of the Artificial Life Conference 2016https://doi.org/10.7551/978-0-262-33936-0-ch011
Artificial Life is concerned with understanding the dynamics of human societies. A defining feature of any human society is its institutions. However, defining exactly what an...
When is bigger better? The effects of group size on the evolution of helping behaviours: Effects of group size on evolution of helping
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., & Lehmann, L. (2017)
When is bigger better? The effects of group size on the evolution of helping behaviours: Effects of group size on evolution of helping. Biological Reviews, 92(2), 902-920. https://doi.org/10.1111/brv.12260
Understanding the evolution of sociality in humans and other species requires understanding how selection on social behaviour varies with group size. However, the effects of g...
How institutions shaped the last major evolutionary transition to large-scale human societies
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., van Schaik, C. P., & Lehmann, L. (2016)
How institutions shaped the last major evolutionary transition to large-scale human societies. Philosophical Transactions B: Biological Sciences, 371(1687), 20150098. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2015.0098
What drove the transition from small-scale human societies centred on kinship and personal exchange, to large-scale societies comprising cooperation and division of labour amo...
An evolutionary model explaining the Neolithic transition from egalitarianism to leadership and despotism.
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., & Lehmann, L. (2014)
An evolutionary model explaining the Neolithic transition from egalitarianism to leadership and despotism. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 281, 20141349-20141349. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2014.1349
The Neolithic was marked by a transition from small and relatively egalitarian groups, to much larger groups with increased stratification. But the dynamics of this
remain poo...
The co-evolution of social institutions, demography, and large-scale human cooperation
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., & Lehmann, L. (2013)
The co-evolution of social institutions, demography, and large-scale human cooperation. Ecology Letters, 16(11), 1356-1364. https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.12178
Human cooperation is typically coordinated by institutions, which determine the outcome structure of the social interactions individuals engage in. Explaining the Neolithic tr...
Punishment can promote defection in group-structured populations
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., Taylor, D. J., & Bryson, J. J. (2012)
Punishment can promote defection in group-structured populations. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 311, 107-116. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtbi.2012.07.010
Pro-social punishment, whereby cooperators punish defectors, is often suggested as a mechanism that maintains cooperation in large human groups. Importantly, models that suppo...
The concurrent evolution of cooperation and the population structures that support it
Journal Article
Powers, S. T., Penn, A. S., & Watson, R. A. (2011)
The concurrent evolution of cooperation and the population structures that support it. Evolution, 65(6), 1527-1543. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1558-5646.2011.01250.x
The evolution of cooperation often depends upon population structure, yet nearly all models of cooperation implicitly assume that this structure remains static. This is a simp...