Many critics of rational choice theory aim at unrealistic psychological assumption of this theory. To what extent is this kind of critic relevant? If we analyze the formalized scheme of choice than we will find difficult to interpret this scheme as psychological theory that develops intentional explanations. We should rather understand this theory as a theory developing causal explanations that are generated by the structure of surrounding. Intencionality in this theory is only a auxiliary tool and the explanation is made in terms of structure, not in terms of mental states. From this perspective most of the critic aim at wrong target.

American policy makers primarily embrace a deterrent-based policing agenda to curb illicit drug trafficking and use that relies on the principles of the economic price elasticity of demand (Boynum & Reuter, 2005). This counter-drug platform includes three fundamental programs: arresting offenders, seizing illicit drugs, and eradicating horticultural sources of illicit drugs (U.S. DEA, 2015). One of the main goals of these programs is to deter illegal trafficking and use by increasing the price of illicit substances so they are no longer attractive to consumers. The United States has weathered various drug use epidemics during its history, and currently it is facing a heroin and opioid epidemic (Dean, 2017). The present multi-dimensional study is guided by three broad goals: to assess the dynamics of illicit drug pricing and the economic price elasticity of demand perspective; to evaluate whether drug trafficking organizations respond to theoretically deterrence based counter-drug law enforcement efforts; and to assess why law enforcement activities are (or are not) effective in controlling illegal drug markets. To accomplish these three broad goals, four separate yet linked focal points comprised of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods evaluations of official data are examined. The findings in the study call into question the current American counter-drug law enforcement agenda being used to address the ongoing heroin epidemic. Furthermore, the results shine light on various shortcomings in overall U.S. counter-drug policy. Finally, the study calls for a new approach to address illicit drug trafficking and use in the U.S.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / This thesis combines human and machine intelligence for consensus decision-making, and it contains four interrelated research areas. Before presenting the four research areas, this thesis presents a literature review on decision-making using two criteria: trust and risk. The analysis involves studying the individual and the multi-stakeholder decision-making. Also, it explores the relationship between trust and risk to provide insight on how to apply them when making any decision. This thesis presents a grouping procedure of the existing trust-based multi-stakeholder decision-making schemes by considering the group decision-making process and models. In the first research area, this thesis presents the foundation of building multi-stakeholder consensus decision-making (MSCDM). This thesis describes trust-based multi-stakeholder decision-making for water allocation to help the participants select a solution that comes from the best model. Several criteria are involved when deciding on a solution such as trust, damage, and benefit. This thesis considers Jain's fairness index as an indicator of reaching balance or equality for the stakeholder's needs. The preferred scenario is when having a high trust, low damages and high benefits. The worst scenario involves having low trust, high damage, and low benefit. The model is dynamic by adapting to the changes over time. The decision to select is the solution that is fair for almost everyone. In the second research area, this thesis presents a MSCDM, which is a generic framework that coordinates the decision-making rounds among stakeholders based on their influence toward each other, as represented by the trust relationship among them. This thesis describes the MSCDM framework that helps to find a decision the stakeholders can agree upon. Reaching a consensus decision might require several rounds where stakeholders negotiate by rating each other. This thesis presents the results of implementing MSCDM and evaluates the effect of trust on the consensus achievement and the reduction in the number of rounds needed to reach the final decision. This thesis presents Rating Convergence in the implemented MSCDM framework, and such convergence is a result of changes in the stakeholders' rating behavior in each round. This thesis evaluates the effect of trust on the rating changes by measuring the distance of the choices made by the stakeholders. Trust is useful in decreasing the distances. In the third research area, this thesis presents Rating Convergence in the implemented MSCDM framework, and such convergence is a result of changes in stakeholders' rating behavior in each round. This thesis evaluates the effect of trust on the rating changes by measuring the perturbation in the rating matrix. Trust is useful in increasing the rating matrix perturbation. Such perturbation helps to decrease the number of rounds. Therefore, trust helps to increase the speed of agreeing upon the same decision through the influence. In the fourth research area, this thesis presents Rating Aggregation operators in the implemented MSCDM framework. This thesis addresses the need for aggregating the stakeholders' ratings while they negotiate on the round of decisions to compute the consensus achievement. This thesis presents four aggregation operators: weighted sum (WS), weighted product (WP), weighted product similarity measure (WPSM), and weighted exponent similarity measure (WESM). This thesis studies the performance of those aggregation operators in terms of consensus achievement and the number of rounds needed. The consensus threshold controls the performance of these operators. The contribution of this thesis lays the foundation for developing a framework for MSCDM that facilitates reaching the consensus decision by accounting for the stakeholders' influences toward one another. Trust represents the influence.

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Background: The victimization of children has been a prevalent issue long before the emergence of social media. The rapid development of the world wide web during the last decades has created more ways to get access to anyone anywhere at any time. This has brought along a yearly increase in the number of children who are abused online with the help of technological devices. So far, the existing research in the field of online grooming has been limited and especially in Estonia. Although the problem has been acknowledged, little is known about the offenders and how they target children for sexual purposes. Aim: The thesis aims to create a fuller picture of different types of online offenders in Estonia by using typology formed by the European Online Grooming Project. Furthermore, it looks into the rational choice processes of these offenders and how they establish a connection with their victims for personal sexual gratification while minimizing their risk of getting caught. Method: The data consists of 13 court cases of offenders who were found guilty in 2017-2022. The documents were accessed in Estonian Harju County Court and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results: The results showed that the most common types of online offenders in Estonia are intimacy-seeking and adaptable. The findings add support to previous research, showing that most online offenders use different controlling tactics like emotional abuse, threatening, blackmailing, and flattery to benefit their chances of gaining sexual gratification from the relationship. To minimize their chances of getting caught, the offenders had chosen vulnerable victims, faked details about their personal information, used different social media applications to their own benefit, and consistently asked the victims about their surrounding environment. Conclusion: The findings of the study are in line with previous research about the typologies and strategies of online groomers whilst providing new data for future research on the topic. The hope is that with a deeper analysis of the groomers behavior, the study helps to create further preventative measures to decrease the number of potential future victims.

This research examines the influence of tourism on migrants’ decisions to move to La Fortuna, Costa Rica, located in the buffer zone of Arenal National Park. Tourism is integral to Costa Rica’s economy and is closely connected to its national parks. Ecotourism is proposed as a non-extractive way for local people to benefit from natural resources, thus contributing to economic development and supporting conservation initiatives. However, if employment opportunities related to tourism encourage high rates of migration to edges of parks, then the resulting population growth could be detrimental to biodiversity conservation goals. Forty participants were interviewed for this project, which used cultural consensus analysis and semi-structured interviews to examine participants’ own behavior as well as shared cultural knowledge of factors that influence migration decisions. Results show that while employment opportunity was influential, other factors such as social stability and tranquility were equally important in participants’ motivations for relocating.

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This dissertation uses Actor Network Theory (ANT) and Stark and Bainbridge's rational choice theory of religion to analyze an established but controversial branch of science and technology, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Of particular interest are the cultural, and sometimes religious, assumptions that its creators have built into it. The purpose of this analysis is not to discredit SETI, but instead to show how SETI, along with other avant-garde scientific projects, is founded, motivated, and propelled by many of the same types of values and visions for the future that motivate the founders of religious groups. I further argue that the utopian zeal found in SETI and similar movements is not aberrant, but instead common, and perhaps necessary, in many early-stage projects, whether technical or spiritual, which lack a clear near-term commercial or social benefit. / Ph. D.

政治參與的問題, 一直是民主理論中各家爭議不休的焦點; 而參與式民主理論的主張 , 無論在理論上或現實中, 亦有其參與上「質」與「量」的兩難困境。因此, 從參與 者的角度來探析此一問題, 應是合理的方式之一。何錶投票參與是參與式民主運作中 最重要的一環, 所以選民投票參與行為乃成為學者研究政治參與時所不可或缺要項。 本文研究目的即於應用理性抉擇論(Rational Choice Theory), 以探討臺灣地區選民 投票參與行為。一方面著重於選民理性投票模型的理論分析, 另一方面亦從事理論驗 證工作; 嘗試尋求具解釋力的變項, 以建構一較能解釋臺灣地區選民長期投票行為的 理性模型。 理性投票理論主要承襲Downs-Tullock(1957,1968)、Riker Ordeshook(1968) 和Fer- john-Fiorina(1974)等三個主要理論途徑而發展。其研究重點依分析層次可區分為: 探討個人投票或不投票之理性計算模型與探討投票率之理性行為模型。至今理論建構 已愈趨完整, 同時亦獲得充分經驗事實的支持, 對於選民投票行為具有很高的解釋力 。 應用此一分析傳統, 我們著重於探討投票率之理性行為模型。研究發現: 無論是在增 額區域立委或縣市長選舉方面, 均具有相當的解釋力; 同時隨著國內政治、社會、經 濟環境的發展變遷, 此一趨勢愈為明顯。其中尤以最近一次選舉(78 年),大體均能驗 證理性模型的假設。此一研究結果, 相信對國內選民投票行為之研究必有相當的助益 。

In today´s society large quantities of goods are shipped both domestic in Sweden as well as across borders. The increasing flow of goods require higher demands on the capacity of the infrastructure and at the same time think and act for a sustainable environment. The overall aim of the study is to highlight development areas for cargo freight by railway. The more specific goals of the study is to identify what enablers that is needed when to establish an intermodal terminal that will handle break-bulk cargo directly from railway, and what barriers that might be. To achieve the aim and goal a qualitative study was conducted with interviews as primal data. Studying the market prerequisites and conducting a competitive intelligence and a benchmark conducted the result. In the result, the interviews and the examined documents has ben compiled, these data has been the basis for the analysis and conclusion. Large parts of the collected data indicated that break bulk cargo handling in intermodal terminals is currently something that is not offered and it is not considered to be economically viable. However, the study also revealed that break bulk cargo handling is a desired service from the business sector as it is regarded as an environmentally friendly mode of transportation, something that the business sector appreciate. To cope with this kind of cargo handling and transportation more research is needed, better cooperation between the private- and the public sector as well as infrastructure changes. / Idag fraktas stora mängder gods både inom Sverige och över landsgränserna. Det ökande godsflödet ställer högre krav på infrastrukturens kapacitet samtidigt som det blir allt viktigare med transporter som är hållbara ur miljösynpunkt. Studiens övergripande syfte är att belysa utvecklingsmöjligheter av godstransport på järnväg. Mer specifika mål för studien är att identifiera vilka förutsättningar som bör finnas vid etablering av kombiterminal med styckegodshantering direkt från räls samt vilka barriärer det finns mot det. För att uppnå undersökningens syfte och mål genomfördes en kvalitativ studie med intervjuer som primärdata. Genom att studera marknadsförutsättningar, genomföra en omvärldsbevakning och en benchmark utformades resultatet. I resultatet har intervjuerna tillsammans med den granskade dokumentationen sammanställts, dessa data har sedan legat som grund till analysen och slutsatsen. Stora delar av insamlade data pekade mot att styckegodshantering på kombiterminal i dagens läge inte är något som erbjuds samt att det inte anses vara ekonomiskt hållbart att hantera styckegods på kombiterminal. Dock visade undersökningen att styckegodshantering på kombiterminal är en önskad tjänst från näringslivet då det anses vara ett miljövänligt transportsätt för gods, något som näringslivet värdesätter. För att klara av denna typ av hantering och transport krävs mer forskning, bättre samarbete mellan den privata och offentliga sektorn samt infrastrukturella förändringar.