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Felix Amante Senior High School

Brgy. San Ignacio, San Pablo City

DISCIPLINE AND IDEAS IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

GRADE 12
WEEK 10
Rational Choice

Most Essential Learning Competencies

- Apply the social science ideas and its importance in examining socio-cultural,
economic, and political conditions.
- Analyze the basic concepts and principles of the major social science ideas:
- a. Psychoanalysis
- b. Rational Choice
- c. Institutionalism
- d. Feminist Theory
- e. Hermeneutical Phenomenology
- f. Human-Environment Systems
OBJECTIVES:
After going through this lesson, the students should be able to:
1. Understand the results of the choices in life.
2. Determine the meaning of choice and decisions in life.
3. Give high regard or importance of a life changing decisions.
Lesson Proper
RATIONAL CHOICE- (law violating behavior occurs after offender’s weight information
on their personal need and situational factors involved in the difficulty and risk of
committing a crime.) it is also known as choice theory or rational action theory, this is
about understanding and often modeling social, economic as well as individual
behavior. It is considered to be as the main paradigm in the currently- dominant
microeconomics school of thought. This is central to other disciplines such as sociology
and philosophy and to the modern political science.
This theory was early popularized by a 1992 Nobel Memorial Prize Laureate in
Economics Science, Gary Becker who became the first to apply rational actor models
more widely. On1989 Elster, stated the importance of rational choice theory and said
that when faced with several courses of action, people usually or tend to do what they
believe is likely to have the best overall outcome. There is a contemporary political
theory which is called as rational choice model, this starts with the assumption that
actors know what they want and can order their wants transitively. This is about
knowing what one wants and requires one to choose the best from among several

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goals, and then failing to attain it resulted to choose the second- best. To put in order
there is three goals to follow, one is to decide which one is better and the other two the
second is better than the third which is transitive ordering.
The concept of rationality that was being used in rational choice is different from the
colloquial and most philosophical use of the word. Colloquially “rational” behavior
typically means a “sensible”, “predictable”, or in a thoughtful and clear- headed manner.
This theory uses a narrower definition of rationality, and its most basic level the
behavior is said to be rational if it’s a goal oriented, reflective or evaluative, consistent
which is across time and suited in different choice situations. This contradicts with
behavior that is said to be random, impulsive, conditioned or adopted by (unevaluated
imitation)
CHOICE THEORIES
Rational Choice- law violating behavior occurs after offender’s weight information on
their personal need and situational factors involved in the difficulty and risk of
committing a crime.
STRATEGIES FOR CONTROLLING CRIME FLOW FROM PREMISE.
1. General Deterrence- this is about people who commit crime and delinquency
because they perceive that the benefits outweigh the risks. Crime is known as a
function of severity, certainty, and speed of punishment.
2. Specific Deterrence- it states that if punishment is severe enough, criminal has a
tendency of not repeating their illegal act.
Incapacitation – this is keeping known criminals out of circulation and later will reduce
the crime rate.
CONCEPTS OF RATIONAL CHOICE THEORY

✔ Law violating behavior is product of careful thought and planning.

✔ Offender or violator choose crime after both personal and situational factors.

✔ Before one decide to commit a crime, the reasoning criminal evaluates risk of the
following factors:
1. Apprehension,
2. Seriousness of expected punishment,
3. The potential value of the criminal
4. His/ her ability to succeed,
5. The need for criminal gain.
OFFENSE SPECIFIC CRIME & OFFENDER SPECIFIC CRIME

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Offender react selectively to To commit a crime individuals must decide

the characteristics of an individual. whether they have the personal needs.

Criminal act. (E.g the decision to commit a crime of burglary)

STRUCTURING CRIMINALITY- economic need/opportunity.

- People commit crime because they need money
- Misled about financial matter.
- They know the people who are successful at crime.
Evaluating Personal traits and experiences:
1. Career criminals may know the limitations of their powers.
2. They know when to take chance and be cautious. Experienced criminals may
turn away from being a criminal when they believe that the risk of crime is greater
than any potential profit.
3. Criminal is more impulsive and have little self-controlled.
4. They are under stress and facing some serious personal problem.
Structuring Crime
Choosing the place of crime- this is when they will commit crime.
Choosing target- criminals locate their target.
Is crime rational? Crimes are the product of careful risk related assignment including
environmental, structural, and social factors.
Is drug use Rational? Criminals believe that drug will provide them a sort of fun,
excitement and thrilling experience.
SITUATIONAL CRIME PREVENTION

✔ Public official must be aware of the characteristics of the situation and sites that
are conductive for crime.
✔ Oscar Newman popularized this approach in the United States in early 19 th
centuries, he coined the term defaceable space the idea that crime can be
prevented or displaced through the use of residential design that reduce the
criminal opportunities such as installing housing projects that maximize
surveillance.
CRIME PREVENTION STRATEGIES
- Need to increase the effort in preventing crime
- Increase the risk of committing crime
- Remove excuses
- Induce gilt and increase shame.

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CAUSE OF SITUATIONAL CRIME PREVENTION

❖ Hidden benefits

❖ Diffusion

❖ Happens when efforts to prevent one crime unintentionally prevents another to

happen.
❖ When crime control efforts on targeting a particular locale help to reduce crime in
the surrounding areas and populations.
BENEFITS OF SITUATIONAL CRIME PREVENTION

o Hidden Costs
o Displacement
o Crime is not prevented but it is re-directed, deflected, or displaced to a more
vulnerable are.
o Extinction
o Situation in which crime reduction programs may produce short term positive
effects but criminals may adjust to new conditions.
o Doing new offenses previously avoided.
o Dismantling of alarms

Replacement- effect that occur when criminal try new offences they had previously
avoided because situational prevention program neutralized their program choice.

1. GENERAL DETERANCE
- Crime control policy depends on the fear of penalties, convincing the potential
law violator that the pains associated with crime outweigh its benefit.
- Theory states that the greater the severity, certainty, and speed of legal
sanctions, the lower crime rate.
- The theory not only states that actual chance of punishment but also the
perception that punishment will influence criminality.

CERTAINTY OF PUNISHMENT- this is about people who believe that their criminal
transgressions will almost certainly result in punishment, then only truly irrational will

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commit crime. Research study shows that there is a direct relationship between crime
rate and certainty of punishment. Additional number of police on street could cut the
crime rate. Police officials should be vigilant, active, aggressive and fighter.

SEVERITY OF PUNISHMENT- severe punishment will threaten the criminals and bring
the crime rate down. This also reduce criminal activities. Another way to lessen crime
rate is death penalty. According to some experts the purpose of the law and justice
system is to create a threat system. Criminals can be desperate people and commit
crime because of no alternative. Criminal may be suffering from personality disorder.
Threat of punishment involve not only severity but also its certainty and degree of
movement. Not every crime can be discouraged, nor is every criminal deterrent.
Research study shows that a deterrent measure may have greater impact on some
people while lesser to other.

SPECIFIC DETERRENCE- theory that holds about criminal sanction should be so

powerful that known criminals will never repeat their criminal acts. Punishments work
when a connection can be established between the planned action & memories of its
consequences, if these recollections are adequately intense, the action is unlikely to
occur again

INCARCERATION- confinement in jail or prison

RECIDIVISM- repletion of criminal behavior.

INCAPACITATION- knowing criminal out of circulation will reduce crime rates. Little
evidence shows that incapacitating criminals deters them from future criminality. Crime
rates may be controlled by the following factors: size of teenage population, threat of
mandatory sentences, economy and gun laws, implementation of aggressive policing
strategies, prison population and crime rate, sentence length and crime

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NOTE: Submit only the Activity page below. No

need to submit the whole file.

Name:__________________________________________ Date:___________
Section:_____________________
Activities: Week 10 Discipline and Ideas in the Social Sciences
Written Work (20 points)
1. Write 5 different choice and decisions in your life that you can consider that made
you to be happy.
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2. What choice made you suffer and why?

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Performance Task (25 points)

3. What will be your decision in life if you choose between your family and the
person that is also very important to you?

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