The Coherence Model of Preference and Belief Formation

• In Event: Recent Advances in Mathematical Sociology

Abstract

Rational choice is the dominant approach in the social sciences to modeling individual and collective behavior. Recently, however, a great deal of criticism has been directed at it, much of from practitioners of the approach itself. Perhaps the strongest criticism has been directed at rational choice's inadequate modeling of preferences and beliefs. While a large literature has arisen to examine alternative assumptions about preferences and beliefs, these new works typically limit themselves to a fairly narrow scope or leave unspecified parameters, creating the impression that one must trade away the strengths of the conventional approach in order to attain greater realism. However, this is not necessarily the case. The coherence model presented here accounts for preferences and beliefs in a way that is generalizable across the full range of contexts where conventional rational choice models can be applied and is compatible with assumptions of rational optimization. It will be based on the assumption that individuals will adjust preferences and beliefs to minimize expected regret, where expected regret is defined as the difference in perceived expected utility between each action taken and the action retrospectively viewed as optimal. Coherence is defined as attaining a state of zero expected regret is referred to as coherence, and is seen as the ultimate "meta-goal" of individuals engaging in "choosing" their preferences and beliefs with a specified set of reality constraints. This model designed to integrate a range of empirical findings and theories about the construction of self from a variety of social science disciplines.

Author

• Sun-Ki Chai, University of Hawaii at Manoa