Evolutionary Game Theory

Classical game theory was initially developed in the mid-20th century for economics and political science, but biologists began recognising its similarity to animal interaction within ecosystems, leading to the application of game theory to evolving populations in biology, called evolutionary game theory. This theory holds promise as a general theory of games and has increased interest among social scientists. Evolutionary game theory differs from classical game theory by focusing on the dynamics of strategy change and does not require players to act rationally as natural selection takes place instead. The mechanism underlying the evolution of cooperation is interdependence between actors over time, which makes cooperation more viable in repeated games as non-cooperation is more easily punished and cooperation is rewarded.