Empathy and berge equilibria in the forwarding dilemma in relay-enabled networks

Device-to-device communications aim to enhance service coverage, particularly at cell edges or in black spots within a neighborhood through relaying and forwarding. In this context, each device is free to move independently, and will therefore change its links to other devices frequently due to connectivity issues. During these movements, a device may be requested to forward traffic unrelated to its own use, and therefore be a temporary router or a relay. This paper analyses the forwarding dilemma from different perspective using psychological game theory. It also provides different approaches that try to solve the forwarding problem in multi-hop relay-enabled networks by means of empathy, mutual support and partial altruism.