Reciprocity and the tragedies of maintaining and providing the commons: A replication and an extension to income inequality

Abstract Social cooperation often requires individuals to exhibit restraint for the greater good, incurring costs for maintaining public goods or establishing them through generosity. Will cooperative behaviors differ between maintenance and provision dilemmas? We replicate findings showing that low cooperation is more likely in maintenance than provision scenarios among a non‐student sample with reciprocity being the main reason behind cooperative differences. A separate experiment reports similar effects in the case of income inequality, also suggesting dilemma‐specific reciprocity is vital in averting the 'tragedy of the commons'. Our findings reinforce and broaden previous conclusions in the literature.