On the effect of memory on the Prisoner's Dilemma game in correlated networks

Abstract

Game theory is fundamental to understanding cooperation between agents. Mainly, the Prisoner's Dilemma is a well-known model that has been extensively studied in complex networks. However, although the emergence of cooperation has been investigated before, the influence of memory in its evolution is not well understood. This paper presents a detailed study of cooperation dynamics in which agents have memory. We simulate the evolutionary Prisoner's dilemma game on random, scale-free and networks presenting degree-degree correlation. Through extensive simulations, we show that assortativity can improve cooperation when the temptation to defect increases. Moreover, we show that the inclusion of memory decreases the network structure influence. Our results contribute to understanding the role of the network structure and the player's memory of cooperation.