A Psychosocial Cognitive Model of Employment Status Choice

Abstract

A model of employment status (self-employed vs. wage-or-salary employed) choice based on psychological, sociological and cognitive variables resolves the traditional shortcomings of occupational tracking models (general applicability, black box treatment of individual processes, and tracking exceptions or “failures”) by using the cognitive heuristics of availability, representativeness and adjustment from an anchor. The model is presented, its components and processes are described, it is partially operationalized in a small example, and implications for future use are briefly considered.