The theory I initially chose to criticize was the social exchange and rational choice framework from our class book. I chose this theory because when we talked about it in class it made so much sense to me. Its propositions and foundations are very applicable to many situations and I felt I had a good grasp of its concepts and structure. However, in doing research for this article, I discovered that, contrary to what our book led me to believe, social exchange is a completely separate theory from rational choice theory. So, in line with this finding and despite my better judgment, I will do my best to convey and critique the information I find about one or both theories and then compare only the social exchange theory with the symbolic interaction framework. Although I will try to get the same information for both theories, there are not many resources describing social exchange theory, and there are many more for rational choice theory, so criticism and discussion may be a little ' unbalanced. Exchange theory in very simple language is a model that describes an exchange of benefits. In the case of social exchange theory, these benefits do not have to be monetary or tangible, but they certainly could be, if that is what was needed (Molm, 2006, p.30). According to Linda Molm, “People depend on each other for much of what they need and value in social life, and they provide these benefits to each other through the process of social exchange” (Molm, 2006, p.24 ). The longer definition and focus of the social exchange framework as defined by Linda Molm is "the benefits that people gain from and contribute to social interaction and the opportunity structures and interdependencies that govern those etc... ... half of the paper ...... Ecological Theories (pp. 02-30) Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books?id=8Jzkgbq2vYwC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0Cook, K., Levi. , M., O'Brien, J. and Faye, H. (2008). The limits of rationality. K. Cook and M. Levi (eds.), The limits of rationality (pp. 02-47 ). Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=7M82yReFf4sC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=definition of social exchange theory and rational choice. Symbolic interaction theory P. Burke (ed.), Contemporary social psychological theories (pp. 1-12) Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books?id=7M82yReFf4sC&dq=definition of social exchange theory and rational choiceDowding, K. (2011). Rational choice theory. In M. Bevir (Ed.), The SAGE Handbook of Governance (pp. 36-40). Retrieved from http://books.google.com/books?id=dU8BNNYnZesC&printsec=frontcover