Civilization Differences in Risk Taking in

Adversarial Situations

Chassy et al., Cognition, 141 (2015) 36-40

Sukaran Arora
10/08/2015

Source: orientalreview.org

Introduction

Civilization: group of states sharing similar values

Types of crisis & strategies:

Hostility
Spinoff
Brinkmanship

Framing of situation as globally positive or negative is a key factor

Perception of situations and the resulting risk-taking attitudes are rooted in cultural values

Chess as a domain

World Segmentation

Ref. Huntington, S. P. (1996). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of the world order. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Measure of Risk : Standard Deviation around Mean

3 Main opening in chess:

Pawn to King 4 (1. e4)
Pawn to Queen 4 (1. d4)
Other first moves

Using Fritz database of 1,546,292 complete games played between 1625 & 2009) and
analyzing the pattern of wins, draws and losses, following values of were obtained

Opening

(%)

Classification

1.e4

41.45

Risky

1.d4

40.02

Conservative

Other first moves

40.64

Mixed

Results (Open Aggression)

Fig. 1. Proportion of risky, conservative and mixed

strategies as a function of civilizations

Jewish are pre-dominantly risk-avoidant players

Chinese and Orthodox civilizations are not predominantly risk-seeking

Buddhist have the boldest approach to risk

Results (Avoiding Conflict)

Conclusions

Buddhist experts used the riskiest strategy nearly 35% more than the Jewish experts

Civilization values influence the perception of risk

Some are more rewarding towards risk-taking attitude
Some reward engagement in battle or a will to change the status quo
Some are just impulsive and misread intentions (Germany, World War 1)

The peaceful measure of avoiding conflict reflects an attitude towards saving energy