Effect of conformism on the dynamics of cultural evolution when conformism-based learning is represented by a coordination game.

<p>In three interaction contexts (social dilemma, coordination game, evasion game), colours and arrows indicate the expected change in the frequency of behavioural strategy <i>A</i> for a given value of <i>γ</i>, the relative frequency of conformism-based learning. In blue regions (arrows to the right), <i>A</i> tends to increase; in red regions (arrows to the left), <i>A</i> tends to decrease. When all learning is conformism-based (<i>γ</i> = 1), cultural evolution will either lead to the fixation of <i>A</i> or to the fixation of <i>B</i>, depending on which strategy was initially most frequent in the population. When all learning is payoff-based (<i>γ</i> = 0), strategy <i>A</i> (‘cooperation’) will disappear in the social dilemma; either <i>A</i> or <i>B</i> will go to fixation in the coordination game; and <i>A</i> and <i>B</i> will stably coexist in the evasion game. Changing <i>γ</i> from 0 to 1 leads to a smooth transition between these two scenarios. Parameters settings: <i>s</i> = 0.2; payoff matrices: social dilemma coordination game and evasion game