128 Social Trap
A tendency to pursue short-term gains that create long-term losses for the greater group.
• A situation in which people act to obtain short-term gains, and in so doing create losses for everyone in their group, including themselves.
• For example, ranchers overgraze cattle on public land. This depletes the land of grasses faster than the land can replenish. This then starves all of the ranchers’ cattle, including the original overgrazers.
• Social traps are most problematic when a resource is readily available and highly desirable, when people compete to access and use that resource, and when the long-term costs are not visible or easily monitored.
• Mitigate the effects of social traps by enforcing sustainable limits on resource use (e.g., fishing limits), rewarding cooperation and punishing freeloading, and increasing the visibility of long-term costs.
See Also Confirmation Bias • Gamification • Nudge Sunk Cost Effect • Uncertainty Principle • Visibility
