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Rational Model of Decision Making
Francis C. Uzonwanne
College of Management and Social Science,
Department of Psychology, Redeemer’s
University, Ede, Osun State, Nigeria
Synonyms
Decision-making models;Leadership decision
making;Rational decisions;Rational planning
model
Definition
Being the opposite of intuitive decision making,
rational model of decision making is a model
where individuals use facts and information, anal-
ysis, and a step-by-step procedure to come to a
decision. The rational model of decision making
is a more advanced type of decision-making
model.
Introduction
Decision making is what hominids do everyday.
From the moment humans open their eyes in the
morning, they start making decisions about
whether to snooze the alarm or just go ahead and
get up. All through the day, decisions are made
continuously until the decision is made to close
their eyes again. Decision making therefore is
what makes the human element alive and func-
tional while deciding the world around them and
ultimately individual personal fates. Decision
making almost always involves choices. In a
world full of choices, the individual personality
is constantly arraigned with options which can be
as basic as what to wear out for the day or what to
have for dinner to decisions about what policies
would have the best intended outcome toward
national economic progress. The business dictio-
nary defines decision making as “the thought pro-
cess of selecting a logical choice from the
available options.”(Decision Making n.d.). styles
are therefore the learned, habitual response pattern
exhibited by an individual, when confronted by a
decision situation (Scott and Bruce 1995). Scott
and Bruce (1995) proposed four different types of
decision-making models: (a) rational decision-
making style, which is characterized by a thor-
ough research for and logical evaluation of alter-
natives; (b) intuitive decision-making style, which
is characterized by a reliance on hunches;
(c) dependent decision-making style, which is
characterized by a search for advice and direction
from others; and (d) avoidant decision-making
style, which is characterized by attempts to avoid
making decisions altogether (Scott and Bruce
1995). Rational decision making is defined and
discussed along with characteristic components
like intuitive decision making. A model of rational
decision making is provided, and some
#Springer International Publishing AG 2016
A. Farazmand (ed.), Global Encyclopedia of Public Administration, Public Policy, and Governance,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-31816-5_2474-1
suppositions about rational decision making are
also discussed.
What Is Rational Decision Making?
While decision-making models like the intuitive
and dependent or even the avoidant decision-
making style may be seen as basic and primary
in the sense that these are used more often on a
daily basis and rely mostly on predisposition, the
rational model of decision making is a more
advanced type of decision-making model. Scott
and Bruce (1995) lay particular emphasis on the
characteristics of thorough research and logical
evaluation as it concerns rational decision mak-
ing. Most people will not go into thorough
research concerning what route to take to work
on a busy day in a crowded city or on what choice
to make out of the several options on a dinner
menu; intuition would probably take care of that.
Intuition, most often, does not require reasoning
or logic. Instincts are the basic driving factor for
the use of intuition in this model. Logical evalua-
tion involves the process of gathering facts and
utilizing logic to organize and analyze these facts
in such a way that they aid accurate or near accu-
rate decision making. According to Oliveira
(2007), rationality has been defined as the “com-
patibility between choice and value.”Rational
behavior therefore seeks to heighten the signifi-
cance of the consequences focusing on the process
of choosing rather than emphasizing the selected
alternative (Oliveira 2007). Rational decision
making is therefore the model of decision making
that is most likely to apply to higher-level decision
making of a more serious nature. These are the
sort of decisions that managers and higher-level
leaders are faced with in their leadership roles.
Rational decision making as defined in a business
dictionary is “a method for systematically
selecting among possible choices that is based
on reason and facts. In a rational decision making
process, a business manager will often employ a
series of analytical steps to review relevant facts,
observations and possible outcomes before choos-
ing a particular course of action.”In rational
decision-making models, decision makers
evaluate a number of possible substitutions from
different possible situations before selecting a
choice (Oliveira 2007). These possible situations
or scenarios are weighed by probabilities, and
decision makers can determine the expected end
result for each choice (Oliveira 2007). The final
choice that the decision maker chooses would be
the one offering the best-predictable consequence
and with the highest prospects of consequence
(Oliveira 2007).
Rational Choice Theory
Rational choice theory is a context for understand-
ing and properly modeling social and economic
behavior (Blume and Easly 2008). The basic idea
of rational choice theory is that cumulative social
behavior results from the behavior of individual
actors, each of whom is making their individual
decisions (Blume and Easly 2008;Sen2008). The
theory therefore focuses on the determinants of
the individual choices (Blume and Easly 2008;
Sen 2008). Rational choice theory then supposes
that an individual has preferences among the
available choice alternatives that allow them to
state which possibility they prefer (Blume and
Easly 2008;Sen2008). These preferences are
also supposed to be complete (the person can
always say which of two alternatives they con-
sider preferable or that neither is preferred to the
other) and transitive (if option A is preferred over
option B and option B is preferred over option C,
then A is preferred over C) (Blume and Easly
2008;Sen2008). The rational agent is assumed
to take account of available information, proba-
bilities of events, and potential costs and benefits
in determining preferences and to act consistently
in choosing the self-determined best choice of
action (Blume and Easly 2008; Sen 2008).
Rational Decision Making and Intuitive
Decision Making
The rational style according to Russ et al. (1996)
is “deliberate, analytical and logical; rational deci-
sion makers assess the long-term effects of their
decisions and have a strong fact based task orien-
tation to decision making”(p. 5). Rotter (1966)
opined that the rational style seems related to
initiation of a structure and an internal control
2 Rational Model of Decision Making
orientation. Kholi (1989) has posited that both
initiation of a structure and a higher internal con-
trol orientation may be linked to higher perfor-
mance. A most directly opposing decision-
making model will be the intuitive decision-
making model. Employing the intuitive style for
making decisions on the other hand involves feel-
ing orientation and is based on an internal order-
ing of the information leading to hunches (Russ
et al. 1996). These intuitive decisions are made
relatively quickly and with limited information
and often changed if the intuition was in error
(Russ et al. 1996). Russ et al. suggest, “Intuitive
decision makers are likely to be more error-prone
and inconsistent, which may lead to uncertainty
and loss of confidence in the manager by superiors
and subordinates”(p. 5). In a high-stake environ-
ment, this type of decision making may be quite
risky. If the decision turns out to be error-prone,
for instance, in an environment where financial
stakes are high, the consequences may be rather
costly. Rational decision making is therefore pre-
dominant where investor stakes and life stakes in
general are high. Intuitive decisions are also made
when there is a dearth of facts and information,
when there is need to come up with an immediate
solution to a problem, and also when the decisions
to be made are challenging. Rational decision
making on the other hand is often characterized
by a precision-based process. This process
involves gathering adequate material in terms of
availability of information, value of the informa-
tion, precision of the information, and reliability
of the information. There is usually a need to
ensure that the solution reached is fail proof.
This is because a properly analyzed fact-based
decision will typically result in a positive and
effective solution. There are setbacks to this pro-
cess however; this materializes in terms of human
inability to gather adequate materials of informa-
tion. It is not unusual for the decision maker to
back down or settle for the amount of material
information at their disposal.
Rational Decision Making and Demographic
Variables, Age and Gender
Rational decision making has been studied in
terms of demographic variables. Two of the most
commonly studied demographic variables are age
and gender. According to Uzonwanne (2016),
“through multiple comparisons examining differ-
ences in decision making by age and gender,
analysis showed that almost the same number of
males and females used the rational decision-
making models.”Though the mean scores were
generally high, comparisons show that executives
who were 60 years and older used the rational
decision-making model more than any other age
group; age may therefore be a factor for the use of
rational decision-making model (Uzonwanne
2016). Löckenhoff (2011), in a review of the
behavioral literature, reveals that older adults are
often more willing to wait over short-time delays
for a larger amount of money compared to a
smaller amount of money available immediately.
Neuroscience research suggests that the accumu-
lation of experience with delayed rewards over the
life span may serve to tune activity in regions like
the ventral striatum (Samanez-Larkin 2013). In
two recent datasets, reported by Samanez-Larkin
(2013), the strong sensitivity to immediately
available rewards in the striatum in young adult-
hood is reduced in older age as older adults show
similar activity for rewards available now or later
(Eppinger et al. 2012; Samanez-Larkin
et al. 2011). One interpretation is that it is as if
the older folks know that $20 is going to be just as
good in 2 weeks as it is today and those in their
twenties just haven’t had the opportunity to real-
ize interest rates over decades and appreciate the
long-term rewards of waiting (Samanez-Larkin
2013). This may be a situation where attempts
should be made to try and get those impatient
young people to make decisions more like the
older folks (Samanez-Larkin 2013).
Suppositions of Rational Decision Making
Suppositions of rational decision making assume
that people naturally want to make the best
choices everytime there is an investment involved
or something of value is at stake. For instance,
people shop for a product of their desire, and when
such a product is found, the individual will mostly
carry out some sort of information gathering, so as
to ensure that they are actually getting their invest-
ment’s worth. This is known as rational choice
Rational Model of Decision Making 3
(Scott 2000). According to Scott (2000), it has
been assumed that people are motivated by
money and by the possibility of making a profit,
and this has allowed it to construct formal, and
often predictive, models of human behavior. One
of these models of human behavior is the rational
choice theory. The rational choice theory was built
around the idea that all action is fundamentally
“rational”in character and that people calculate
the likely costs and benefits of any action before
deciding what to do (Scott 2000). Another related
supposition is that an individual is cognitively
capable of searching for and gathering useful
facts that aid their final choice. Such information
and facts are based on success criteria pertinent to
the situation or the individual. The individual is
able to create the time and also the resources
required for rational decision making in order to
achieve an effective and functional solution.
A Model of Rational Decision Making
Rational decision making may involve several
different processes. Regardless of the various
steps in each process, rational decision processes
have similarities that mostly result in effective
solutions. A model of rational decision making
is presented in the following steps:
1. Identifying the problem that requires a solution
2. Identifying the solution scenario
3. Carrying out a gap analysis
4. Gathering facts, options, and alternatives
5. Analyzing option outcomes
6. Selecting best possible options
7. Implementing decision for solution and evalu-
ate final outcome
Identifying the Problem that Requires
a Solution
It is important in any problematic situation to
properly clarify what the problem is that requires
a distinct decision-making process for a solution.
If the problem is not properly understood, the
decision maker may engage in doing too much
or too little to solve the problem. As a president-
elect, the Obama-Biden team created an elaborate
document on “change.gov”(The Obama-Biden
Plan) highlighting a detailed description of the
problems America faced at the time. It was not
enough to say that America was in a recession; the
beginning of a rational solution was to understand
what aspects of the American economy defined
the recession. A manager of a restaurant in finan-
cial distress must be able to accurately define the
nature and source of the problem. If the nature and
source of the problem are not accurately defined
or identified, the manager stands a risk of throw-
ing solution options at a situation that is working
well or doing little to resolve the actual problem.
Identifying the Solution Scenario
Equally important in the rational decision-making
process is defining what a solution scenario will
look like at the end of the process. What charac-
teristics will determine that a solution has been
found? In other words, what will success look
like? What are the identifiers that will be observed
to characterize success? For instance, if XYZ are
in place, will that mean success? For some man-
agers, if the organization’sfinancial returns are
enough to pay the bills, remunerate the
employees, and also have enough profit to service
investor portfolios, then that is a picture of suc-
cess. For some other managers, that is a problem
that requires rational decision making for solu-
tion. Indices and marginal qualifiers are some
determinants of success for many. If the numbers
fall beyond the preset indices or qualifiers, then a
problem is identified. Success will simply mean
that the profit levels have exceeded the preset
indices and qualifiers by a preset minimum ratio.
Understanding what success will look like is inev-
itable for accurate gap analysis.
Carrying Out a Gap Analysis
A gap analysis is simply defining and understand-
ing the gap between the problem and the solution.
What is it going to take, for instance, for the
organization to go from the identified problem to
the identified solution? The business dictionary
defines gap analysis as “a technique that busi-
nesses use to determine what steps need to be
taken in order to move from its current state to
its desired, future state.”In other words, now that
4 Rational Model of Decision Making
the problem has been accurately defined and an
accurate picture of success has been determined,
the next step will be to determine what it takes to
go from problem to solution. Again, the Obama-
Biden team was able to clearly document the steps
that they were going to take to bring America back
to where they had identified as success for the
nation. This is an aspect of rational decision mak-
ing that should involve other people as think
tanks. In this regard, all the possible steps
involved with the gap analysis will be mostly
identified. If the solution will require project man-
agement for solution, the steps identified in the
gap analysis will become the specific goals and
specific success criteria that will be achieved
toward success. During think tank sessions, the
manager or management is able to accurately ana-
lyze where the organization is and where they
want to be but, most particularly, how to get there.
Gathering Facts, Options, and Alternatives
The next phase in this rational decision-making
model is to gather facts and options surrounding
the steps that have been identified in the gap
analysis. To be properly informed is at the center
of effective rational decision making. With the
information gathered, considerations will be
made on how the steps that will be taken will
affect the stakeholders involved, positively or
negatively. Somebody somewhere may have
researched the steps to be taken or may have
even taken similar steps. The facts from the out-
comes may prove very useful in the eventual
decisions made at that point.
Analyzing Option Outcomes
With the facts in hand, the consequences or out-
comes of the various options identified should be
analyzed to determine the most effective and func-
tional option. Adequate time should be allotted for
studying and identifying the possible outcomes of
each of the options to be studied. An integral
aspect of the study will be to weigh in on how
the different outcomes will impact stakeholders
involved. There may be outcomes that do not
favor some stakeholders while the same outcomes
favor others. Situations like these can be challeng-
ing to resolve. This is where a think tank team may
be useful again. The goal is to accurately predict
the outcome of each of the options selected, and
from these predictions, a final option is selected.
Implementing Decision for Solution
and Evaluating Final Outcome
After the best option has been selected, the deci-
sion has to be implemented accurately as decided
for effective and functional solution. This phase of
the model may sound redundant, but it is an
imperative aspect of rational decision making.
Securing a hitch-free implementation of the deci-
sion made provides a successful closure to the
process. After the decision or option has been
implemented, it is also important to evaluate the
final outcome based on the solution scenario that
was created in the second step. Has success being
achieved? If it is not looking like success, then
there is a need to go back to the gap analysis phase
and reevaluate the steps decided for the solution
process.
Conclusion
Rational decision making has been defined as a
more advanced type of decision-making model,
laying emphasis on the characteristics of thorough
research and logical evaluation, selecting among
possible choices based on reason and facts. The
basic idea of rational choice theory which is pre-
mised on the assumption that cumulative social
behavior results from the behavior of individual
actors, each of whom is making their individual
decisions, is highlighted. Studies have shown that
older adults typically tend to lean toward rational
decision making more than younger ones. There
were no apparent gender-based differences how-
ever. Despite the time and resources involved,
comparisons show that rational decision making
offers more effective and functional solutions than
intuitive decision making. Intuitive decision mak-
ing is identified as a most directly opposing
decision-making model in comparison to rational
decision making. Decision-making models in
general should be an integral aspect of training
focus for all executives, leaders, and managers in
the governmental and in the entrepreneurial
Rational Model of Decision Making 5
worlds. Rational decision making should be
extensively included in leadership training, semi-
nars, and conferences, specifically those that bor-
der around management and sustainable
development within organizations and govern-
ments. Younger managers and leaders should be
particularly identified as recipients of rational
decision making based on findings. Suppositions
and assumptions of the rational making model are
identified, while a decision-making model process
is elaborated. Rational decision making is posi-
tioned as the most promising, effective, and func-
tional decision-making process for leaders,
managers, and individuals, especially when stake-
holders, investments, and high stakes are
involved.
Cross-References
▶Ethics and Social Policy
▶Governance and Leadership
▶Leadership, Ethics and Decision-Making
▶Psychology of Leadership
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6 Rational Model of Decision Making
