Thesis on "Boudon 2001 and Eskensberger"

Quoted Instructions for "Boudon 2001 and Eskensberger" Assignment:

You are to write a 3-page paper. Read the article below. Please answer the discussion question, State the question first and then continue to answer. *Do Not Use Outside Sources.*

Discussion question:

What concepts in the articles of Boudon 2001 and Eskensberger 2001 *****Can Current Instructors Apply in the Adult Education Program?*****

Boudon 2001: Theories of Social

Social action has become an important topic in sociological theory under the influence of the great German sociologist Max Weber. To him, social action, which includes both failure to act and passive acquiescence, may be ***** to the past, present, or expected future behavior of others. To ever, explaining a social phenomenon means analyzing it as the effect of individual actions. He says explicitly in the letter addressed the year of his death to a friend, the marginalist economist Rolf Liefmann: sociology too must be strictly individualistic as far as its methodology is concerned. The *****˜too***** means that sociology should according to Weber followed the same principles as economics a principal later christened methodological individualism by Joseph Schumpter and later popularized by Frederick Hayek and Karl Popper. This principle states simply that in a collective phenomenon is the outcome of individual actions, attitudes, beliefs, etc. To methodological individualist as Max Weber, a crucial step in any sociological analysis is to determine the causes of individual actions. Max Weber introduces and a crucial second postulate: that the causes of any action lie in the meaning to the actor of his actions. Thus, calls responsible for the fact that I look on my right and my left before crossing the street is that I want to avoid the risk of being hit by a car. To this operation aiming at retrieving demeaning and to the actor of his actions, Max Weber gives a name: Verstehen, to understand. Given the importance of the Verstehen postulate, Max Weber calls the style of sociology resting upon these two postulates comprehensive sociology. To Max Weber, by contrast with notably Dilthey, the notion of comprehension characterizes exclusively individual actions, attitudes or believe. Weber 1992, proposed in his posthumous work Economy and Society a distinction between four main actions. Actions can be inspired by an instrument of rationality: when an actor does X because he perceives X as an adequate way of reaching a goal G. they result from axiological rationality when an actor does X because X is congruent with some value he endorses. Actions are traditional when they are ***** to the fact that such actions have been readily performed in the past, and are perceived as recommended by virtue of that fact. Finally, an action is *****affective***** when it is inspired by some feeling more generally emotional state of the subject.

The functional theory Social action

An important contribution to the theory of social action is Parsons***** The Structure of Social Action 1937, a work where the American sociologist attempts to provide some little idea of social action developed by Max Weber, Durkheim, Pareto, and Alfred Marshall. Parson devotes much attention to the point that, to Weber, at is defined as ***** to the behavior of others. He is notably concerned by the ideas that social actors are embedded in systems of social roles. To him, roles rather than individual should be considered as the atoms of sociological analysis. This shift from individual to roles was inspired to Parsons by his wish of combining the Weberian with the Durkheimian tradition, individual actions with social structures. The most popular aspect of Parson theory is the typology of the pattern variables. These pattern variables are a set of four binary attributes by which all roles can in principle be characterized. Thus, the role of a bank clerk is specific in the sense of where his relation to the customer is limited to well defined goals, by contrast with the role of, say, *****mother*****, that is diffuse. The role of mother is ascribed, while the role of the clerk is achieved. The former is particularistic in this sense where it deals with specific individual; the latter is universalistic: the clerk is the supposed to apply the same rules and indistinctly to all customers. Ralf Dahrendorf 1968 saw in the Parsonian theory a definition of the Homo sociologicus and a proper basis for making sociology a well-defined discipline, resting on a well-defined set of postulates. While economics sees the Homo oeconomicus as move by his interest and as able to determining rationally the best ways of satisfying them, the Parsonian Homo sociologicus was described as moot, not only by interest, but by the norms and values attached to his various roles. Merton 1949, develop ideas close to Parson*****s insisting on the norms and values attached to roles but also on and incompatibilities generated by the various roles and individual is embedded in. It must be recognized, though, that the idea according to which the parsonian homo sociologicus would guarantee to sociology foundations as a solid as the homo oeconomicusto economics, has never gained recognition. More precisely, while most sociologist except the idea that norms, besides interest should be taken into account in the explanation of action, they doubt that be parsonian homo sociologicus can be expressed in an form able to generate deductive theories as precise and powerful as the Homo oeconomicus. The skepticism toward the parsonian theory of action that appeared in the 1960s result not only from this theoretical consideration but also from conjunctural circumstances. In the 1960s, the so-called functional. A general and a label that covered in the sociology with a Parsonian inspiration became strongly attacked. Critical sociologist objected to functionalism in that it would contribute to legitimate the existing social institutions while the main objective also geology should be to criticize them. To this unfair objection in other, equally unfair, was added: that functionalism would not be scientific ally fruitful. Functionalism provides a useful their radical framework to develop a social logical theory of stratification, of that legitimacy of institutions, and of other social phenomenon. But it is true that it did not succeed in providing a theoretical basis from which sociological research could develop cumulatively. By contrast with the Homo oeconomicus, the Homo sociologicus of the functionalist tradition failed to generate a well identify research tradition.

The utilitarian theory of social action

Neither critical theory and war other more recent sociological movements, as ethno-methodology or phenomenonology succeeded in providing a solid basis for the theoretical consensus among sociologists. Balkanized character of sociological theory incited some sociologist to propose to identify the Homo sociologicus with Homo oeconomicus fact that the model of Homo oeconomicus had actually been applied successfully to several kinds of problems, will be traditionally to be jurisdiction of sociology. Thus, the so-called theory of opportunities rest on the postulate that criminal behavior can be analyzed as a maximizing behavior. The economist G. Tullock 1974 had shown that differential data about crime could notably be accounted for by a theory close to the theory of behavior used by neoclassical economist. G Becker, another economists proposed to analyze social discrimination along the same line. In Accounting for Tastes, Becker 1996 analyzes addiction as resulting from cost-benefit considerations and claims that the rational choice model, namely the model of Man proposed by neoclassical economist, is the only theory able to unify the social sciences. This general idea has been developed by J. Coleman 1990 in his foundation of social theory. The idea of explaining social actions can buy the utilitarian postulates is not new. Classical sociologists use it occasionally. Thus, in his the old regime and the French Revolution, Tocqueville explains the underdevelopment of French agriculture at the end of the 18th century, at a time when British agriculture knows a phase of quick modernization is the effect of landlords absenteeism. As to the latter it results from the fact that the French landlords were better off socially when they bought a royal office and when they stayed on their land. The French centralization meant that many royal officers were unavailable and brought crest each, power, and influence to bills field them. In Britain by contrast, a good way of increasing one*****s influence was to appear as a innovative gentleman farmer and by so doing getting local and even to a national political responsibilities. Tocqueville*****s van owners make their decision on the basis of cost-benefit analysis along the line of the rational choice model. The social outcome is different in the two contexts because the parameters of the two context are different. But Tocqueville uses this model exclusively on subjects where it seems to account for historical facts.

The utilitarian postulates defended by rational choice modelists where not only occasionally used by Tocqueville, they had also been treated as universally valid by some theorist notably Marx and Nietzsche and their followers. To Marx, and still more Marxian*****s, individual actions and beliefs should be analyzed as motivated by class interest even though the final role of his interest can be remained unrecognized by the actor himself (false consciousness). To Nietzsche and still more Nietzscheans individual actions and believes should be analyzed as motivated by the positive psychological consequences on the actor himself. Thus, to Nietzsche the Christian faith developed originally among lower classes because of the psychological benefits they could derive from endorsing a faith that promised paradise to the weak and the poor. In his essay and the sociology of religion, Weber 1920-1 is critical toward theories: my psychological or social interests can draw my attention on an idea, a value or a theory; I have a positive or negative prejudice toward them. But I will endorse them only if I think they are valid, and not only because they serve my interest. Weber*****s position has the advantage of making useless the controversial . As rightly stressed by Nisbet 1966, the ideas of false consciousness in the Marxian sense the concept itself being due to F. Mehring and other rationalization in the Freudian sense have become a commonplace ; they postulate highly conjectural psychological mechanisms, though. The utilitarian approach proposed by rationale choice theorists old little to this Marxian-Nietzsche tradition. The motivation of rationale actually it*****s used by a neoclassical economics explain many social phenomenon of interest to sociologist. Moreover, they make possible the use of mathematical language in sociological theory building. Above all, they provide final exclamations without black boxes. While the rationale choice approach is important and can be a fact of the use of many subjects it claims to beat the theoretical ground on which sociology could be unified is unjustified. Its limits on more and more clearly recognized by economists. Thus, Bruno Frey 1997, has shown that under some circumstances people are more willing to accept unpalatable but collectively beneficial outcomes and they are to accept outcomes for which they receive compensation. Generally, a host of social phenomenon appear as resistant to any analysis of the rational choice type as the example of the so-called voting Paradox suggests. As in a national election a single fold has a practically zero influence on the outcome why should a rational voter vote? Ferejohn and Fiorina 1974 have proposed considering the paradox of voting as similar in its structure to Pascal*****s bet: as the issue of the existence of God is crucial, even if the probability that God exists is supposed close to zero, I have an interest in betting that he exist. Pascal argument is relevant in the analysis of attitudes toward risk. Thus, it explains why it is not necessary to force people to take an insurance against fire: the cost of the insurance is small and the importance to me of the damage is being compensated in the case of my house would bar is great, so that I would normally subscribe. At the same argument can be realistically used in the case of voting behavior is more controversial, notably because actual folders often show a very limited interest in the election. Overbye 1995 has offered an alternative theory: people would vote because nonvoting would be negatively regarded so that nonvoting would entail a cost. But rational people should see that any individual will fails to influence the outcome of an election; why then should they consider not voting as bad? Another theory claims that people also resisting on the rationale choice model submits that people vote because they like to vote. In that case the costs of voting being negative the paradox disappears. Simple as it is the theory introduces the controversial assumption that voters would be victims of their false consciousness, since they do not see that they just like to vote and believe that they will force some higher reason. Moreover this very does not explain why the turnouts is variable from one election to another. Actually no theory using the basic postulates of the rational choice model appears as convincing. The good exclamation is that people vote because they believe that democracy is a good regime that elections are a basic institution of democracy and that one should vote as long as one has the impression that a policy or a candidate are better than alternative ones. This is an example of what Weber called axiological rationality.

The cognitive theory of social action

The theory of action characteristics of neoclassical economics and used by rational choice theorists was made more flexible by H. Simon. His study of decisions within organizations convinced him that decision makers take satisficing rather than optimizing decisions: because of the cost of information stopping a deliberation process as soon as one has discovered a satisfying decision can be more rationale than exploring further the field of possible decisions. A chess player could in principle determine the best next move. Actually this would entail a huge number of computations. So he will use rather rules of thumb. Simon qualified this type of rationality as bounded. His contributions to stress the crucial point that social action includes an essential cognitive dimension and invite sociologist to drop the postulate of neoclassic economics use for distance and game theory, a court to which a social actors would be fully informed when they take their decisions. Experimental cognitive psychology has also contributed to this sociology. It has shown that ordinary knowledge is often biased as in the case where respondents are confronted with a situation when they have to estimate the probabilities of alternative events. Thus, in an experiment subjects are invited to guess the outcome of a heads and tails game with a bias coin where heads and tails have a probability of coming out, respectively, of 0.8 and 0.2. Now by doing so, they are worse off than if they would predict heads all the time, since they would then win on average eight times out of 10, while with their preferred strategy the probability of winning is (0.8 x0.8) + (0.2 x 0.2)=0.68. rather than talking of biases in such cases it is perhaps more illuminating to make the assumption that when people are faced with problem-solving situations they tried to deal the theory satisfying to their eyes but depending of course of their cognitive resources. In that case people use the theory that says they are asked to predict a sequence of events heads or tails a good strategy is to use the law governing the actual sequence generated by the experimenter. So while wrong the answer may be analyze as understandable since inspired by a theory which in other situations would be valid. All scientific theories also generally result from understandable systems of reasons. Priestley did not believe in the phlogiston theory because he was affected by some cognitive bias but because strong reasons convinced him of the existence of the phlogiston. Fillieule 1996 has rightly contended that the theory of sociological action should take seriously the meaning of the notion of rationality as the find not only by a neoclassical economics but by the philosophy of science as well. In the vocabulary of the philosophy of science and actor is rational when he endorses a theory because he sees it as grounded on strong reasons. Durkheim 1912 maintains in his elementary forms of religious life that scientific knowledge and ordinary knowledge differ from one another in degree rather than nature. Even religious and magical beliefs as well as the action generated by these believe should be analyzed in the same fashion as scientific beliefs: primitive Australians have strong reasons to believe what they believe. One can call this type of rationality evoked Durkheim as well as by philosophers of science cognitive rationality. Applications of this motion are easily found. In the early phase of the Industrial Revolution in Britain, the Luddites dished right their machines because they thought that machines destroy human work and generated unemployment. Their action was grounded on a belif and they believe on that theory. They endorsed the theory because it is grounded on a strong reason: a machine is effectively designed and built the purpose of increasing productivity by substituting mechanical for human work. So other things equal, when a machine is introduced and a factory it destroys effectively some amount of human work. But other things are not equal: an economic system as a whole human work is needed to conceit, Beal, maintained, and modernize the new machines so that on the whole the new machine can create more work than it destroys. Whether this is actually the case is entirely empirical question. But at a local level the workers have strong reasons to believe that the introduction of new machines are the threat to new employment. Taking cognitive rationality into account the size the instrumental type of rationality used and rational choice model is essential to the realistic theory of social action. As stressed by Weber as well as Durkheim believes are a normal ingredient of social action. Now believes cannot generally be explained by the rationale twice model: I generally do not believe that X *****“is true because believing so serves my interest but because I have strong reasons for believing. The dominant status and contemporary sociology of the intermeddle utilitarian conception of rationality***** rated in the rationale choice model has the effect that the powerful institution of classical sociologist according to which, first, explaining believe should be a main concern in the sociological theory of action and, second, the leafs should be analyzed as endorsed by social actors because they have a strong reason for endorsing them appears actually as neglected. Normative and axiological believes besides representational believed are also a crucial ingredient of social action. Weber distinction between instrumental and axiological rationality introduced the crucial idea that normative beliefs cannot always be analyzed at the product of instrumental rationality nor a fortiori by the contemporary rationale choice model which considers exclusively instrumental rationality. Boudon 1998 has admitted that a fruitful interpretation of the notion of axiological rationality would be to consider the axiological believes are legitimated and the mind of the actors because the latter see them as grounded on strong reasons. Axiological rationality would then be a variant dealing with prescriptive rather than descriptive beliefs of the cognitive type of rationality. Axiological rationality is responsible notably for the evaluation for people bear on situations they are not involved in. The rational choice model cannot for distance of account for the opinion of people on the topic such as death penalty because most people are obvious not personally concerned with the issue. They have strong convictions on the subject though. Should we consider these convictions as irrational since the rational choice model is unable to account for them or decide whether to follow an elaborate on the classical sociological theory of rationality?

Introduction: activity, action, operation

Psychology has distinguished various classes of behavior, reflexes, affective responses, and goal ***** activities. The special nature of goal ***** activities is the clearest when they are contrasted with the behavior of human beings who are not or not yet able to orient their activities to goals mentally retarded people or goals with major injuries to the frontal lobes of the brain. Those activities that are not organized toward goals are typically characterize as trial and error impulsively and unreflectively driven without direction or orientation and without examination of the consequences of alternatives. Goal ***** selection of programs known or yet to be developed is lacking. The project was that of activities are not ***** toward gold implementation. They are neither integrated parts of linear sequences of steps nor subordinated parts of hierarchical plan. Hence they are all perceived to be of equal importance for gold implementation. Furthermore there are no anticipating comparison between the given state and a desired goal state. Finally a prospective evaluation of consequences is lacking. There are distinctions to be drawn among the concepts of activity, action, and operation. Activities are motivated and regulated by higher order goals and are realized to actions that are themselves relatively independent components of each activity. Action differs from other with respect to their specific goals. Actions may themselves be decomposed into their subordinate components the operations. Operations are described as subordinate because they do not have goals of their own. Operations can be taken to the movement patterns or in the case of mental activities elementary cognitive operations. The concept of psychology of activities has been since the mid-20th-century central to the tradition especially up Russian and German psychology. There are many points of agreements with but also important differences between the orientations of the leading research group particularly those of Leontjev 1979 a student of Vygotski*****”Rubinstein 1961, and Tomaszewski 1981. The philosophical foundations of Marxism the psychological findings of Lwein 1926, the psycho-physiological results of Bernstein 1967, the numeral psychological results of Luria 1973, and suggestions of Cybernetics particularly of systems theory, have all contributed to the development of this concept. The basic idea of this concept is that activity cannot adequately be researched in stimulus response terms. The elements or building blocks of even primitive and unchallenging real-life activities are not just responses or actions but goal ***** actions. Goal orientation however does not mean a strictly top-down planned activity. Instead goal ***** real-life activity is opportunistically organized which means that people are trying to accomplish goals by a kind of muddling through with some planned episodes. In a modern review from the very special point of view of linking cognition and motivation to behavior was presented by Gollwitzer and Bargh 1996 and a more general review was written by Frese and Sabini 1985. The concept of goal ***** activities and actions is relational on that relates at least five components: the anticipated and desired results represented as the goal, the objects of the activities raw materials which typically have their own laws governing how they can be transformed from a given state into the desired one, transformations of the physical or social world nailing requiring the expenditure of energy and the use of information the actual change of objects without which there would be only an unimplemented intention, the acting person, with her/his ability to have an impact on and attitudes toward the processes these processes in turn act back on the person, and that means needed for and the contextual conditions of the activities.

Eckensberger 2001

Action Theory: Psychological

The action theory is a formalized and unitary. Agreed upon by the scientific community but rather a unique perspective narrative or paradigm. Although this perspective very in saliency during the history of psychology it has been in existence since the very beginning of psychology in the 19th century old in Europe and North America. In Germany Brentano a teacher of Freudian focused 1874 on intentionality as a basic feature of consciousness leading to the concept of acts of consciousness. 10 years later, Dilthey distinguish between an explanation of nature and an understanding of mind/soul, a dichotomy which paved the way for ongoing discourse on the dichotomy of explanations and understanding. In 1920 Stern criticize the mainstream psychology of his time because it neglected intentionality and also cultural change as a created framework for human development. In Paris, *****t wrote his dissertation about Automatisme in 1889. This was the beginning of an elaborate action theoretical system of neuroses. In North America James developed a sophisticated theory of action at the end of the 19th century that anticipated a remarkable amount of action theory concepts. Munsterberg a disciple of Wundt proposes action as the basic unit of psychology and stead of sensations at the turn of the century. The early tradition of overrules by the Neo-positivistic logic of explanation expounded by Vienna circle and philosophy and behaviorism in psychology. They were taking up in philosophy by Wittgenstein*****s language games that are different and natural science and humanities. In psychology action theory turns have increased in importance again during the 1960s to the 1990s. In fact in recent times human actions or aspects of it is taken as a framework for analysis and/or research in many branches of psychology. This is true for basic science: in theory some motivation, problem-solving, ontogenetic development, social psychology, and particularly in cultural psychology. And it is true for applied domains: a clinical psychology, educational psychology, organizational psychology or psychology of work, and sport psychology. Under an action theory Prospective the boundaries between these domains become fuzzy. Cultural psychology f or instance, becomes an integrated enterprise which is developmental as well as conflict affective and motivational. Beyond this diversity of action based near East and psychology, human actions are also focused on in other human sciences. It is particularly reflected upon in philosophy and has a long tradition in sociology and anthropology. Finally a second tradition exists basically equivalent to action theories and with hardly the same roots in *****t work: the Russian activity theory in the tradition of Vygosky, Luria, Leontiev, is most famous representatives. In the US this framework is particularly elaborated and applied by Cole, Rogoff, Valsiner, Wertsch; in Germany by Holzkamp.

Attributes of action: considering the breadth of action theoretical frameworks is not surprising that the issues same studied are not identical and that the terminology is not coherent or fully agreed upon by different authors or traditions. Actions as an analytical unit: from an analytical perspective it appears necessary to note that: to act does not mean to behave although some authors consider actions as that particular subtype of behavior; to speak of an action instead of behavior implies the following features. Intentionality broadly speaking it means that sentences, samples, but also mental states referred to something in the world. Intentionality therefore occurs if a subject called agency refers to the world. Agencies referred to the world by acting with reference to the world, by experiencing it they think, feel, perceive, etc. and by speaking about it: the latter is called speech act. An intentional state thus implies a particular content and a psychic mode a subject can think that it rains, wish that it rains, claim that it rains, etc., where rain is the content, thinking, wishing, and claiming are modes. The intent of the action is the intentional state of an action the intended consequence or goal is content. This implies what is also called Futurity or future orientation of an action. Although some try to explain actions by interpreting these intentions as causes of action there is agreement at present that actions cannot epistemologically be explained by material causes, but have to be understood in terms of reasons. This leads to serious problems in psychology is understood as a natural science which basically interprets events in terms of causes. It follows that actions are not necessarily observable from the outside. If they are one also uses the turn doing. However allowing something to happen as well as refraining from doing something are also actions. Control over the action: it is assumed that action involves the free choice to do something (a or b.) to let something happen or to refrain from doing something. This condition is strongly related to the subjective perception of free will. Although the control aspect is sometimes also expanded to include the intended he thinks of an action these two aspects should be distinguished because the effects of an action can be beyond the control of the agency, although the decision to act itself was controlled. The basic structure of an action which aims at some effect to bring something about is the following: analytically it is assumed that the means applied to carry out an action follow rationally from the intentions i.e. they can be justified or made possible by the agency. They are chosen on the basis of finality in order to reach a goal. If they are applied the result is some change and this change leads casually to some consequences. Those consequences of actions that represent the goal are attempted others are unintended. To let fresh air into a room intended goal one opens the window does something, after having opened the window is open result and lets fresh air in intended, but the room may become c old unintended. So actions in principle are conscious activities of an agency. The agency cannot reflect upon their actions as well as upon themselves as agency. This is why Eckensberger 1979 for cold interpreting action theories as a theory family based on the self reflected subject or agency. This position is related to the basic issue of whether or not Homo sapiens has a special position in nature because this species is the only one that can decide not to follow natural laws. Once more this holds this a serious problem for psychology as a natural science. There are different types of actions: if directed at the physical/material world and aimed at bringing about some effect also letting things happen or suppressing some effect, they are called instrumental actions; but its actions are directed at the social world, i.e. at another agency B, they cannot causally bring something about in B, but have to be coordinated with B*****s intentions. Therefore agency B*****s intentions have to be understood and interpreted by agency A. This presupposes a communicative attitude. This type of action is consequently called communicative action. If this orientation not only implies understanding B, but also respecting B*****s intentions this is clearly a moral action. If B*****s intentions are simply used for A*****s benefit it is a strategic action. Interestingly in non-Western philosophies/religions Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism this adaptive attitude and respect for the non-A is extended to include the plant and animal world. So one may distinguish between two action types which aim at A*****s control of the environment instrumental and strategic and two action types which aim at harmonizing A with the environment communicative and adaptive actions. Although an agency is in principle considered on anonymous actions are not arbitrary but follow rules of prudence as well as of social/cultural conventions and/or expectations. This tension between autonomy and heteronomy is basic to all action theories that also focus on social/cultural context of actions. One tries to resolve the tension however by assuming that cultural rules and their alternation are also man-made although the implied intentionality of cultural rules/norms may get lost in time. In principle within the theoretical frame and action links the actor and his/her environment and cultures are considered intentional worlds or action fields. Actions as empirical units: the most recent and comprehensive review of action related to research and developmental psychology is given by Brandtstadter 1998: hierarchical of goals there is considerable agreement among researchers that empirically actions do not just have one goal but many. They can be seen as forming a chain or a hierarchy.

To read an article may have the goal of understanding particular problems and may be considered an action. Reading individual characters on paper may be taken as sub-actions or elements of an action called *****˜actemes***** by Boesch1991. Yet reading the article can also be embedded in a large set of goals passing an examination, and may even be part of overarching far-reaching goals like becoming famous. These hierarchical are particularly elaborated in the application of action theory to work and sport settings i.e., instrumental contexts. But they are also relevant to communicative actions. The fact that actions are meaningful to an agency implies that it is exactly this meaning, which has to be identified empirically. This calls for hermeneutic methods because actions have to be interpreted. Harre 1977 calls for an ethogenic approach ethogenics literally mean meaning-giving. This does not just referring to the dichotomy between qualitative and quantitative methods in psychology, but is a basic methodical feature derived from the theoretical model of an action should be noted, however, that no science can do without interpretation. Beyond the structural ask banks of actions the course of actions is particularly relevant in empirical contexts. This is divided into action phases the number and features of these action phases differ however: while, Boesch 1991 distinguishes three action phases beginning phase, its course, and end others Heckhausen propose four phases a pre--decision phase, a pre-actional phase the action phase (doing) and a post-action phase. Here the decision to act plays an important role uses the metaphor of crossing the Rubicon. In all these phases there is an interplay between cognitive, affective, and energetic aspects of action. Affects determines the valence of a goal and therefore of the environment in general, and his actions have more than one goal, goals are also polyvalent . Additionally, affects also a valuable eight the course of action dealing with the areas, the impediment during the action and its end was the action success or not. These impediments basically increased consciousness and dust regulatory processes are of special interest in empirical research. They are basically coping processes dealing with occurring in the bank*****s external more primary control, actional, or secondary control. From a systematic point of view regarding these regulatory processes as secondary actions is attractive because they are action ***** actions. All questions relating to an agency are of particular empirical interests. First the consciousness of actions is discussed differently. While some authors claim that consciousness is a necessary aspect of an action which also implies the methodical possibility of asking actors about their actions, others claim that only the potential self reflectivity of an agency and a specific action is crucial. This not only implies that a self reflective action may be a rare event during a day but also the actions can turn into automatisms etc. yet still remaining actions. This calls for the analysis of the development of actions. Development therefore it is a genuine and crucial dimension in many action theories as micro- process or actual Genesis, as ontogenesis, and as social/cultural change. Second, the development of the agency is a focus of research. Here study on self-development became relevant. Of particular interest in this context is the agency perception of being able to act called action potential more communicative competency as a triggering more incitement condition for agency development. Third, the development of agency can itself be considered an action as a project of identity development which has a goal and which may fail. Therefore, for polls calling these identity projects which have agency related action structures, tertiary actions. The structural component distinguished above intentions, analogy, causality, etc. have also become read the central empirical research and topic. In fact the expanding research on theory of mind and scripts can be interpreted systematically as a program aiming at the question of whether or not and by what age children can think in terms of action structures distinguish between casual and intentional states etc. this strategy has also been applied to the development of moral judgments by Eckensberger and Reinshagen 1980, when analyzing arguments used in moral dilemmas in terms of action structures. Thus most research programs on social cognition can be reinterpreted in terms of action. Since that action links an agency with the social and nonsocial environment, this action is the overlap between the internal and external action field. The internal action field is formed during ontogenetic experiences in the sense that actions are internalized as operations in Piagetian since and normative rules from action bound taskonomies to generalized taxonomies. These developments as well as controlled theories individual rule systems logic, understanding of morality, law, conventions and ideas of the self as agency constitute the internal action field. The external action film which is understood this culture provides opportunities and strains for action but it also attributes value to action. Rituals as a culture proffer of organized action clusters and myths as complements of fantasms on the cultural level are just as important as personal processes of construction active production of water in the Piagetian sense. Like actions (the action field) can also have different levels of comprehensiveness and the organized hierarchical. According to Boesch 1991, for instance, the external action field of culture can be subdivided into action spheres like occupation or family and action domain like the office or kitchen. Both, the internal and external action field acquire their affective meaning (valence) via action.

Action theory as opportunity for developing an integrated psychological theory: the uniqueness of the action theory approach to humans not only poses problems for the definition of psychology as a natural science, but also entails the possibility of developing an integrated theory, which not only interrelates different developmental dimensions (actually genesis, ontogenesis, and cultural change) but also resolves most of the *****˜classical splits***** in psychology ( Overton 1998), like body/mind, nature/culture, cognition/ affects. The psychological basis for action as well as the phylogenetic emergence of self reflectivity in nature can both be understood as enabling conditions for human actions (Harre 1977). Cognitions and affects are integral parts of human actions and their development.

Action, collective

Collective action is the means individuals use to pursue and achieve their values when individual action is not possibly more likely to fail. Collective action is that he and all the social sciences: in economics, it is the period of public goods and of collective choice; in sociology, it is linked to rational choice, collective behavior, and social movement theory. When markets fail because of an imperfect competition, externalities, transaction costs, and collective good provisions, and some other reasons, institutions and organization governments, political parties, corporation, universities, churches, kinship, and social movements etc. *****“ structure collective actions and allocate resources through nonmarket methods. Among these institutions have been conventions, ethical codes, morality, and norms which contribute to the efficiency and welfare and social transactions. In the broadest sense, and collective action seeks to explain the origins, evolutions, and varieties of nonmarket institutions. Most collective actions is undertaken by organizations that initiate, coordinate, control, and reward individual participation in a joint enterprise. In a narrow sense the theory of collective action deals with the non--coerced voluntary provision of collective goods the groups and organizations that provide them participation and contribution in their pursuit and contentious actions against targets that resist collective goods attainment. The group and organizations are interest group, Civic Association, an advocacy group, dissidents, social movements, insurgents, and more transitory social formations such as crowds. Collective and mass phenomenon which result from many individuals pursuing personal goals and factual and temporal proximity as and a migration, the baby boom, or the fluctuation of public opinion, have been viewed when the as aggregations of individual choices and believes. Nevertheless when there are strong externalities and when individuals to strategically, collective action. Provides powerful insights about aggregation dynamics. Schelling 1978 has shown that housing choices and makes the race resident*****s neighborhoods can lead to avoid extreme pattern of racial segregation and racial preferences of the majority of people in broken groups. Similarly Boudon 1982, showed how French higher education reforms meant to increase the opportunities of working-class youth led to the perverse effect of increasing it affluent youth. Unanticipated consequences, positive and negative bandwagons, unstable equilibria, critical Mass, and threshold effects are common consequences of collective action and to the central theory.

Collective behavior

Collective behavior refers to fads, panic, crazes, hostile crowds, riots, cults, moral panics, cargo cults, witch hunts, ghost dance, and the like. The conventional explanation for some variety of social psychological and psychodynamic processes such consciousness of kind, herd instinct, imitation, contagion, and repression. Observers which drunk by the spontaneity and volatility, the emotional expressive and transitory character of such behaviors in contrast to normatively she structured everyday routines. Collective behavior was thought to result from extreme deprivation and threat perception in extraordinary situation when norms and expectations fail to guide action. The best-known theorist in this tradition was LeBon 1960, who postulated three laws of crowd behavior: mental unity, loss of rationale and moral faculties, and hero worship. The problem with LeBon*****s and kindred theories of collective behavior is there a highly selective character and disregard for alternative explanations. For the same episodes of crowd behavior and the French Revolution that LeBon describes, Rude 1959, showed that they were atypical of crowds and many could be explained as purposive action without assuming unproven social psychological processes. Later theorist showed that uniform behavior and mental unity and are due to select the convergence of predisposed participants, and that much variants of behavior occurs, ranging from engagement by hard-core activists to standing around my curious bystanders. Rather than amorality, emergent norms in structure crowd behavior. Irrational crowd behavior results from the n-person, single game, prisoner*****s dilemma aspect of some collective behavior, as in panics of escape. Because of the shortcomings in the conventional view, collective behavior has been explained with collective action theory, even violent, destructive and bizarre collective behavior, such as lynch mobs, riots, and the witch hunts of early modern Europe. Southern US lynch mobs in 1880 *****“ 1920 were structured, ritualized, and predictable. To be sure, some collective behavior manifests a lack of emotion, we-feeling, hate, fears, violence, and unusual beliefs, yet participants do respond to the benefits.