Punishment and persistence pay: a new model of territory establishment and space use

Existing game theory on aggressive interactions associated with territory establishment typically assumes that pairs of contestants engage in ‘winner takes all’ fights for indivisible space. New work by Stamps and Krishnan explores an alternative scenario where space use emerges from a series of aggressive interactions where punishment and persistence, rather than winning per se, shape observed patterns. This new approach generates novel predictions for game theory, such as the possibility of gaining space not by winning, but by ‘nagging’.