The functioning of groups and societies requires that individuals cooperate on public goods such as healthcare and state defense. More often than not, individuals face multiple public goods and must choose on which to cooperate, if at all. Such decisions can be difficult when public goods are attractive on one dimension (e.g., being "efficient" in providing comparatively high returns) and unattractive on another (e.g., creating inequality by providing some group members greater returns than others). We examined how people manage such decision conflicts in five preregistered experiments (N = 900) that confronted participants with two public goods that varied in efficiency and (in)equality of returns. People cooperated more on the comparatively efficient public good and on the equal-return (vs. unequal-return) public good (Experiment 1), yet when the unequal-returns public good was also the most efficient, individuals cooperated comparatively more on this unequal-but-efficient public good when they themselves benefitted the most from inequality (Experiments 2-4). Low beneficiaries largely ignored public goods efficiency and preferentially cooperated on the equal- rather than unequal-returns public good. Expectations (Experiments 2-4), preferences for revising the multiple-public-goods provision problems' choice architecture (Experiments 3-4), and descriptive norms held by uninvolved arbitrators (Experiment 5) echoed these cooperation patterns, but uninvolved arbitrators deemed it socially appropriate to cooperate more on the equal than the unequal public good regardless of beneficiary position. We discuss implications for theory and policy on cooperation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

---

平等和效率塑造了多种公共产品提供问题中的合作。


团体和社会的运作需要个人在医疗保健和国家国防等公共产品上进行合作。通常，个人面临多种公共物品，并且必须选择合作（如果有的话）。当公共物品在一个方面具有吸引力（例如，在提供相对较高的回报方面“高效”）而在另一个方面没有吸引力（例如，通过为某些群体成员提供比其他成员更高的回报而造成不平等）时，这样的决策可能会很困难。我们在五个预先注册的实验（N = 900）中研究了人们如何管理此类决策冲突，这些实验让参与者面临两种效率和回报（不）平等的公共产品。人们在相对有效的公共物品和平等回报（相对于不平等回报）的公共物品上合作更多（实验1），然而当不平等回报的公共物品也是最有效率的时候，个人在这种不平等的公共物品上的合作相对更多-但有效的公共物品，当他们自己从不平等中受益最多时（实验2-4）。低受益者在很大程度上忽视了公共物品的效率，并优先在平等回报的公共物品上进行合作，而不是不平等回报的公共物品。期望（实验2-4）、修改多元公共品供给问题选择架构的偏好（实验3-4）以及未参与仲裁员持有的描述性规范（实验5）呼应了这些合作模式，但未参与仲裁员认为这是无论受益人地位如何，在平等的公共利益上进行更多的合作比在不平等的公共利益上进行更多的合作在社会上是适当的。我们讨论对合作理论和政策的影响。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2024 APA，保留所有权利）。