Analytic Teaching Using Rational Choice Theory

he purpose of this article is to suggest what we consider to be a unique teaching and learning strategy. We have had some good results with this approach and believe it can be successfully employed in a wide variety of social science courses, both undergraduate and graduate. Equally impor-tant, however, is our unanticipated discovery that the analysis to be presented here is also capable of serving another function, namely as a method of synthesizing a wide diversity of topics within the field itself. We will return to this theme after our analysis and discuss it in more detail. RATIONAL CHOICES We have found that many sociological topics can become more relevant if students are given an opportunity to have some «hands on » experience with them. This pragmatic function in teaching sociol-ogy can be supplemented by both field observations and conventional library research. Specifically, we have found that students can think more critically about the utility of doing sociological analysis if they are called upon to make concrete decisions about genuine issues and justify making those decisions. One perspective that lends itself to this task is that of decision theory. By decision theory, we are basically using the analysis set forth. in Jeffrey’s (1983) important work. We will present this model below and argue it is especially suited for (advanced) undergraduate courses in social issues, social problems, social change, sociology of education and other areas. Of course, the decision theory model can be extended in a variety of ways and for graduate courses utilizing, for example, Coleman’s (1990) rational choice analysis, as well as other perspectives. The area of rational choice theory is large and growing, and as Little (1991) points out ranges from notions of utility and preference through game theory and differing models of rationality. For under-graduate classes useful introductions may be found in Little (1991) and Elster (1992, 1986). For those instructors wishing to delve further into this area, and especially, its foundations in the «Bayesian» statistical approaches and the issue of «subjective probabilities, » there is Howson and Urbach (1990).