Remembering Cheaters

A popular assumption in evolutionary psychology claims that reciprocal altruism is supported by a cognitive module that helps individuals to detect and remember cheaters. Enhanced memory for cheaters would be suited to avoid social exchange situations in which we run the risk of getting exploited by others. In line with this idea, previous studies found a source memory advantage for faces of cheaters relative to faces of cooperators. However, such findings should not be interpreted uncritically. This effect can also be explained with more general cognitive mechanisms. A general preference to attend to and remember negative and unexpected information may ensure that our limited processing resources are focused on relevant information. Therefore, enhanced source memory should be found for a variety of situations, proving to be more adaptive than a mechanism exclusively focused on cheating.