An empirical investigation as to the need for multicomponent decision models

The adequacy of an exclusively attitudinal component model, which is analogous to the traditional decision-theoretic model, in which each option is scored and weighted on multiple attributes, is investigated. The results indicate that a purely attitudinal model is inadequate when predicting the career intentions of young people. This conclusion holds, irrespective of how the relative weights used in the attitudinal component model are measured. It is shown that an adequate model must include normative (i.e., judgments of others´ beliefs) and affective (i.e., emotional) components in addition to the attitudinal component. Although decision-theoretic models can readily be expanded to include the normative component by including attributes that represent judgments of others´ beliefs about alternative actions, it is not clear how to include a global affective component.