Does competition really bring out the worst? Testosterone, social distance and inter-male competition shape parochial altruism in human males.

ABSTRACT: Parochial altruism, defined as increased ingroup favoritism and heightened outgroup hostility, is a widespread feature of human societies that affects altruistic cooperation and punishment behavior, particularly in intergroup conflicts. Humans tend to protect fellow group members and fight against outsiders, even at substantial costs for themselves. Testosterone modulates responses to competition and social threat, but its exact role in the context of parochial altruism remains controversial. Here, we investigated how testosterone influences altruistic punishment tendencies in the presence of an intergroup competition. Fifty male soccer fans played an ultimatum game (UG), in which they faced anonymous proposers that could either be a fan of the same soccer team (ingroup) or were fans of ot

SUBMITTER: Diekhof EK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4116333 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature