Changing cooperation to competition disrupts attitudes and valence

With the cessation of cooperation between groups or individuals comes the threat that temporary competition transforms into destructive intractable conflict. To better understand how intractable conflicts develop, Liebovitch, Naudot, Vallacher, Nowak, Bui-Wrzosinksa, and Coleman (2008) recently developed a non-linear model of two-actor cooperation-competition incorporating interaction feedback and valence. This study tested their model's predictions by investigating attitude and valence change depending on whether a social exchange was cooperative or competitive. Participants experiencing an exchange that switched from cooperation to competition exhibited greater attitude change than participants in the control or the continuously competitive interaction condition and more valence change than the control or competition switching to cooperation condition. These results support the model's prediction that greater attitude and valence fluctuation manifests in interactions transitioning from cooperation to competition, providing the first verification of the model. These findings offer new insights into how human cooperation and competition evolve over time.