Ladder theory of individual behavioral decision making

Using a formal mathematical model, this paper investigate the action mechanism of decision behavioral under subjective perception changing of task attributes on quite generic framework. Our model builds on work in two kinds classical behavioral decision making theory: “prospect theory (PT)” and “image theory (IT)”. We investigate three important factors of general behavioral decision making problems which involves complete decision making process, uncertain context and multiple mission attributes. Strategies collection and selection mechanism are induced according the description of practical decision making behavior. A novel individual behavioral decision-making model called “ladder theory (LT)” is proposed. By comparing real four decision cases, our analysis shows that the LT have better explanation ability then PT and IT under some decision situations. Furthermore, we use our model to shed light on that the LT theory can cover PT and IT ideally. It is the enrichment and development for classic behavioral decision theory and it has positive theoretical value and instructive significance for explaining plenty of decision-making phenomenon, and it may improve our understanding of how individual decision-making is performed actually.