Path-building operates simultaneously at individual, network, and field levels of analysis.

Evidence

Another important issue addresses the level of analysis. Our three-stage model aims at explaining path-building processes of and in organizations. However, other levels of analysis are also of great relevance—particularly by the individual level, the network level, and the field level. Organizational members, with their cognitive schemata, learning habits, response patterns, and so forth, do play a role in path-building processes in organizations. Although a vast body of research on individual rigidities is available (see Huff & Huff, 2000: 46–59, for a review), individual path research stills awaits elaboration. — Jörg Sydow, Georg Schreyögg, and Jochen Koch, Organizational Path Dependence, 123

Categorization

• QUESTION: Individual path research is flagged as undeveloped — how do personal cognitive schemata scale up into organizational lock-in?
• XREF: Recalls Kahneman-style cognitive rigidity and the psychological literature on habit and learned responses.