Unsticking the rationality stalemate: Motivated reasoning, reality, and irrationality

Rasim Serdar Kurdoglu, Daniel Lerner and Nufer Yasin Ates

Journal of Business Venturing Insights, 2022, vol. 18, issue C

Abstract: Rationality is an elusive and increasingly debated concept in entrepreneurship research. We offer a novel conceptualization of rationality based on reasoning motivations. We posit that logical, probabilistic, and heuristic reasoning logics are motivationally rational because the decision-maker attempts to accurately perceive the external world and problem-solve (even if rapidly and approximately). By contrast, when the reasoning ignores an assessment of reality and accuracy in problem-solving and instead is deluded by psychological (e.g., hedonic) urges that prompt self-serving inferences, we categorize such decisions as motivationally irrational. We develop a theoretical account for how motivational irrationality is adaptive under extreme uncertainty as it enables entrepreneurs to dare action when even heuristic reasoning is inconclusive or entirely ineffective.

Keywords: Business venturing; Irrationality; Uncertainty; Entrepreneurial decision-making; Entrepreneurial action theory (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobuve:v:18:y:2022:i:c:s2352673422000348

DOI: 10.1016/j.jbvi.2022.e00336

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