DISS: Rational Choice Theory

Micro Level Approach

• individuals as level of analysis

• focus on social interactions, why individual/group interact the way they do, and how they interpret the meanings of their own interactions

• analysis of small patterns; focusing on a particular aspects of social life

Macro Level Approach

• social aggregate (collection of people who share physical location) as the level of analysis

• focus on the social structure, social institutions, political and economic change

• analysis of large patterns; taking into account the whole picture of the society

• focuses on broader social phenomena

• whole social structure

• system and Phenomena

• implies that there is a system with interrelated parts

Rational Choice Theory

a tool in making sense why people act or behave in the way that they do

Three Pillars of RCT

1. strategies or courses of action open and available to them

2. preferences over the end-states to which combinations of actions
chosen by the various players lead

3. beliefs about important parameters

• actions are based on their preferences, beliefs, and strategies