{"pk":24648,"title":"Can epistemic vigilance explain the underuse of social information? Evidence that a competitive incentive favoured dishonest advice and reduced the influence of social information.","subtitle":null,"abstract":"Cultural evolutionary theory has shown that social learning is adaptive across a broad range of conditions. However, humans frequently under-utilise beneficial social information in experimental settings – a phenomenon termed egocentric discounting. We tested the hypothesis that influence is affected by expected reliability using a two-player online task in which both participants answered the same questions in series. After a first attempt, player 2 saw either advice from player 1 or their actual answer (spying). In addition, we manipulated the payoff structure of the task such that it had either a cooperative, competitive, or neutral incentive. As predicted, advice was least honest and social information overall had the least influence in the competitive condition. Player 2 also chose to spy rather than receive advice when offered the choice. Unexpectedly and regardless of the payoff structure, advice was more influential when player 2 could choose information but spying was more influential otherwise.","language":"eng","license":{"name":"","short_name":"","text":null,"url":""},"keywords":[{"word":"Anthropology; Psychology; Behavioral Science; Evolution; Learning; Computer-based experiment"}],"section":"Abstracts","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0185s54c","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Robin","middle_name":"","last_name":"Watson","name_suffix":"","institution":"Arizona State University","department":""},{"first_name":"Thomas J. H.","middle_name":"","last_name":"Morgan","name_suffix":"","institution":"Arizona State University","department":""}],"date_submitted":null,"date_accepted":null,"date_published":"2024-01-01T18:00:00Z","render_galley":{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/24648/galley/20973/download/"},"galleys":[{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/24648/galley/14246/download/"},{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/24648/galley/18036/download/"},{"label":"PDF","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/cognitivesciencesociety/article/24648/galley/20973/download/"}]}