Abstract. Cooperative/non-cooperative behavior of individuals is one of the factors affecting the welfare of society. The prisoner's dilemma is a strategic game that demonstrates the common problem of cooperation in many areas of economic and social life. The basis of the problem of cooperation in this game is that the players in the game follow a worse equilibrium strategy while there is a better equilibrium (Pareto Efficiency) for them. This study aims to examine the cooperative/non-cooperative behavior of the students who are in an exam process by creating a similar situation with the prisoner's dilemma with a question. With this experiment, the possibility of gaining additional points to the exam points was presented to attract the students. These points represent the “pay off” in the prisoner's dilemma game. As a result, it is seen that students act in a similar way to the resulting equilibrium in the prisoner's dilemma game. In addition to these findings, it is determined that cooperative/non-cooperative behaviors of students are significantly affected by gender and course success factors.

Keywords: game theory, cooperative behavior, non-cooperative behavior, design of experiments