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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 20, 2026

Combining Behavioral Endocrinology and Experimental Economics: Testosterone and Social Decision Making
11:51

Combining Behavioral Endocrinology and Experimental Economics: Testosterone and Social Decision Making

Published on: March 2, 2011

Commitment and self-control in a prisoner's dilemma game.

Matthew L Locey1, Howard Rachlin

  • 1Psychology Department, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794, USA. matthew.locey@stonybrook.edu

Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior
|August 2, 2012
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Commitment responses, or self-imposed restrictions, can improve self-control when facing choices between immediate rewards and larger, delayed ones. However, these behavioral improvements are not sustained once the commitment option is removed.

Keywords:
commitmentcooperationhumansprisoner's dilemmaself-controltit-for-tat

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Area of Science:

  • Behavioral Economics
  • Decision Science
  • Psychology

Background:

  • Humans often struggle with self-control, preferring smaller-sooner rewards over larger-later ones.
  • This conflict between immediate gratification and long-term benefit is a key area in behavioral economics and decision science.
  • Commitment responses are self-imposed restrictions that can alter future choices.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate if commitment responses can enhance self-control in situations involving delayed gratification.
  • To examine the impact of different types of commitment responses (cooperation vs. defection) on behavior.
  • To determine if the effects of commitment responses persist after their removal.

Main Methods:

  • Two experiments were conducted using a prisoner's dilemma game against a tit-for-tat computer strategy.
  • Participants could choose to cooperate (larger-later reward) or defect (smaller-sooner reward).
  • Commitment responses were introduced, forcing choices for subsequent trials, with conditions for forced cooperation, defection, or both.

Main Results:

  • Most participants opted for commitment responses, even with a minor penalty.
  • The commit-to-cooperate group showed significantly more cooperation than the control group.
  • The commit-to-defect group showed significantly less cooperation than the control group.
  • Cooperation commitment was strongly preferred when both options were available.
  • Gains in cooperation were not sustained when the commitment option was removed in Experiment 2.

Conclusions:

  • Commitment responses can be an effective tool for improving self-control and promoting long-term goals.
  • The type of commitment response (cooperative vs. defecting) significantly influences behavior.
  • The positive effects of commitment strategies on self-control are dependent on their continued availability; they do not appear to create lasting behavioral change without ongoing support.