ABSTRACT
Economists have long been developing a theory of how individuals decide which goods to sell and for what price, or what goods to buy on the marketplace and for what price. Psychologists have broadened the purely economic analysis of such decisions to explain how people make decisions between choice alternatives in all phases of their lives. The concept of economic man was developed to enable economists to perfectly predict the choice behavior of an ideal man. Economic man was presumed to be perfectly informed about his available choice alternatives and the exact outcomes associated with each of his choices. When influence attempts are directed at him, the target individual has only two alternatives: to comply or to noncomply. Analyses of the decision processes of target individuals as recipients of warnings or mendations follows very much the same rationale as that of threats and promises.
