Types of Actions (with examples)

A action it is something that a person, an animal or a thing does, that is, an operation that an agent carries out, intentionally or not, and that has an effect as a consequence. For example: A child who raises the glass with his hand to drink water. / A drug that acts on heartburn.

Stocks can be classified in various ways. The most general categories are differentiated by the form and degree of expression with which they are carried out. These are divided into:

• physical actions. They are those that are performed with body movements that transform the environment. For example: An office worker taking a bus to work.
• verbal actions. They are those whose execution is a form of oral expression and they modify the environment only when they are enunciated. For example: A person tells a friend that he is making a bad decision by wanting to return to the country.
• attitudinal actions. Are those whose execution is evidenced in the posture or adoption of a attitude determined that evidences the decision of the person. For example:
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  A student who feels sad and isolates himself from the rest of the group, to show displeasure and disagreement.
• inactions. They are those that are based on the decision not to intervene in any way before an idea or a stimulus, whether internal or external, and it becomes the opposite of action. For example: A man who sees through the window that his car is being stolen and continues to do the task he is doing without intervening.

• See also: action verbs

Types of actions

There are many classifications of actions depending on their nature, causality, intention, purpose or the field of knowledge that defines and categorizes them.

Types of actions for psychology

In the field of psychology, the following are part of the most important types of actions:

• instinctive actions. They are those that are carried out unconsciously and are associated with ideas such as the protective instinct or the immediate reaction. For example: Look for water when you see that something has caught fire.
• reflex actions. They are those that occur as a reflection of an external stimulus. For example: Sneezing when you've inhaled lint.
• impulsive actions. They are those that are carried out consciously in the face of situations in the environment without thinking carefully about them and their consequences. For example: A person who looks at a travel promotion and buys it moved by the emotion of the moment.
• actions of will. They are the basic and deliberate actions that an individual performs in their daily life. For example: Cook a pasta dish.

Types of actions for sociology

According to sociological studies, actions are divided into:

• collective actions. They are those in which more than one person intervenes with a common purpose. For example: A massive march to ask for political reform.
• human actions. They are those that reflect the different behaviors exhibited by the human being, which are the reflection of the culture where he is inserted. It is the simplest and most individual concept of action, which has as its premise the action of a human being for any reason. For example: Get up to drink a glass of water.
• social actions. They are those that seek to make a transformation in the environment that affects the individual as well as other people in her environment. For example: A building manager who decides to turn up the heat in all the apartments.

Types of actions according to sociologist Max Weber

For the German sociologist Max Weber there are four ways in which actions can be classified:

• Actions with a rational goal. They are those that seek a specific purpose and are carried out with the impulse of the will of the decision of the person who executes it. For example: A doctor who takes action regarding the treatment of one of his patients.
• Rational actions originating in individual values. They are those that are carried out following the moral and ethical framework of the person. Although not always the most convenient for the subject, it is considered the right thing to do. For example: A son who goes to visit his grandparents at the nursing home, even though he doesn't really enjoy the time he spends with them.
• affective actions. They are those that are motivated by feelings that are experienced with great intensity and that is the strongest cause to perform the action. For example: A person who helps his partner to move out of the apartment and does it only for the love he has for him.
• traditional stocks. They are those that are executed by habit or that are already stipulated in a framework of conduct that the individual follows. For example: A person who buys a gift to take to a friend who is having a birthday.

Examples of types of actions

1. A pilot landing the plane he is driving on an airport runway.
2. Parents who prepare dinner for their entire family.
3. An employee who visits her boss to tell her about his resignation decision.
4. A farmer who gets up early to start harvesting his field.
5. A programmer who makes a new application to sell it online.
6. A man who talks to his wife to express his desire to have a child.
7. A woman who runs away when a friend of hers scares her on the street.
8. A child who arrives at his grandparents' house and greets them with a hug.
9. A firefighter who runs towards the truck when he hears the alarm of a fire in the city.
10. A writer who sits down very early on a Sunday morning to finish her novel.

Interactive exercise to practice

Follow with:

• Continuous and simultaneous actions
• Principle of action and reaction
• Cause and effect
• relative and absolute motion

References

• “The concept and types of actions in human activity” in floodplanuk.
• "Action" in Wikipedia.
• Paez Diaz de Leon, L (ed). 2001. The Sociological Theory of Max Weber. Essays and texts. Mexico: UNAM.