Why to buy your darling flowers: On cooperation and exploitation

Trusting in someone's cooperation is often connected with the danger of bei ng exploited. So it is important that signals are exchanged which make it p robable enough that the potential partner is reliable. Such signals must be too expensive for partners who are planning to abuse the trust they are gi ven but cheap enough for those who wish to initiate a long-term cooperation . In a game theoretical model, it is shown that such signals could consist of presents given before the partnership starts. These presents must be mor e expensive than the advantage of a one-period exploitation but smaller tha n the profit from a longterm partnership. In order to prevent that the rece iver only collects presents, and that she is not interested in a firm partn ership, these gifts should be of low value for her. Flowers are the prototy pe of such presents but usually not the only and not the most important sig nal of this kind. Nor is the partnership between men and women the only exa mple of cooperative relations which are endangered by exploitation - but of all exploitation stories this one is most often narrated.