The 'Economic Man' (Reference Request) We are writing a paper about the 'economic man.' By this, we mean that the choices he makes epitomize a rational economic thinker. However, we also acknowledge the fact that there are other, non-economic reasons that people make decisions such as religion. What (if any) literature addresses the idea that even with other considerations, a person will still act rationally in the economic sense. Preferably we would like to have a theoretical model that encases these other choice considerations. Also, we would love to hear whether there are any case studies on this idea.
I would point you firstly to work pioneered by the late Gary Becker on applying the principles of economic optimisation to non-market behaviour.

Becker's insight was that the kinds of trade-offs people face when trading goods and services also affect many other kinds of decisions, including things such as criminal behaviour or marriage and family life. For example, Becker modelled criminals as deciding what crimes to commit based on an evaluation of the costs (if caught) against the benefits flowing from the crime's proceeds (whether material or psychological). A list of Becker's papers can be found on Repec.

Becker's style of applying economics to such topics has been influential and there are now huge literatures applying economics to social behaviour of every variety—to the extent that it is hard to even know where to begin summarising such literatures.

At the time of Becker's death, many leading economists wrote articles summarising his impact on the field of economics.



Becker's contribution was recognised with the award of the 1992 Nobel Prize. The citation read


  for having extended the domain of microeconomic analysis to a wide range of human behavior and interaction, including nonmarket behavior.


The Nobel press release is here and his Nobel lecture "The Economic Way of Looking at Behavior" was published in the Journal of Political Economy.