 Social inference and occupational choice: Type-based beliefs in a Bayesian model of class formationJournal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), 2014, vol. 51, issue C, 30-37 Abstract: Beliefs are a key motivator of individual behavior. As such, an understanding of how individuals’ beliefs develop is a prerequisite to understanding decision-making and behavior. While rational choice theory posits a Bayesian framework for belief formation, status construction theories argue that beliefs are strongly influenced by status typifications. In this paper, we develop a Bayesian model of belief formation in which individuals use (irrelevant) information on others’ observable type to bias their beliefs. This model is used to analyze a simple occupational choice setting, thereby shedding light on the micro–macro inter-relationship between observable type (e.g. race, gender) and social class. Keywords: Social inference; Occupational choice; Discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:soceco:v:51:y:2014:i:c:p:30-37 DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2014.04.001 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics) is currently edited by Pablo Brañas Garza More articles in Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics) from Elsevier |
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