Rational Choice Theory in Sociological Theory

Rational Choice Theory (RCT) posits that:

• People weigh costs and benefits of any action, and go with the action that has more benefits than costs
• All choices are rational, based on the goals an individual has
• Actions that are objectively harmful remain rational, when considered in the context of the beliefs that drove them (these beliefs may be incorrect, they only need to be sincerely held, and the action must be taken in line with the cost/benefit analysis those beliefs logically lead into)
• Things that might lead to incorrect but rational beliefs include wishful thinking, incomplete information, time constraints on decision making, etc
• Individuals behave rationally, when the situations those individuals are in are fully and completely taken into account (and this may never be entirely possible, making RCT potentially hard to criticise as it may be hard to disprove, because of this)
• Also posits three kind of requirements or 'rules': people's wants/desires do not change (they remain consistent); people's wants/desires fall along spectrums and NOT separate categories; and desires remain the same between different people (Goldthorpe 1998 but also general understanding)
• Lots of variations of RCT, and these can be seen across three metrics - strong versus weak requirements for rationality; situational versus procedural rationality; and general versus specific theories of rational action (Goldthorpe 1998)
• You wouldn't ask people's desires, but would predict them
• Cost/benefit ratio NOT psychological analysis must lead to the conclusions, psychological analysis may not be used
• RCT based on maximising utility
• Utility = highest possible income (reward) with lowest possible effort (cost)
• Neither changing preferences NOR varying preferences between individuals may ever be used in RCT to explain behaviour, or it isn't RCT any more
• Dennett 1981"goal/desire (end) + belief (means) --> (rational) act" (Dennett 1981)

Criticisms of RCT:

• Assumes people must always be rational (which is of course problematic)
• According to some critics at least, it cannot account satisfactorily for things like snap judgements, etc
• Can be seen as being a tautology
• Following on from Homans 1964, RCT may see itself as being more of a 'real' theory (i.e. a scientific rather…