Game theory: A basis for analyzing emerging norms and conventions in outdoor recreation

Abstract

Games of conflict, cooperation, and coordination are reviewed for their relevance to understanding outdoor recreation behavior. In conflict games players receive zero‐sum payoffs. To avoid conflict these games can be recast as cooperation games, which have non‐zero‐sum payoffs. Cooperation games are problematic because they have only one equilibrium solution that players often fail to recognize. The “Prisoner's Dilemma,” one of the most common cooperation games, is presented as a basis for understanding how norms can emerge from negotiated solutions to recreation activity and resource impact disputes. Coordination games, in which multiple equilibrium solutions are possible, are presented as another means for understanding how regular patterns of behavior can develop in outdoor recreation situations. The problem in coordination games is for players to choose one of two or more equally acceptable equilibrium solutions. Coordination games provide a basis for defining conventions, those regularizes of human behavior found in recurrent situations in which two or more equally acceptable solutions are possible. The emergence of norms and the development of conventions as opposite poles of a continuum of processes that humans use to develop regular patterns of behavior are discussed.

Keywords:

• conventions
• cooperation
• coordination
• emerging norms
• game theory
• outdoor recreation
• use conflict