Application of arrangement theory to unfolding models

Arrangement theory plays an essential role in the study of the unfolding model used in many fields. This paper describes how arrangement theory can be usefully employed in solving the problems of counting (i) the number of admissible rankings in an unfolding model and (ii) the number of ranking patterns generated by unfolding models. The paper is mostly expository but also contains some new results such as simple upper and lower bounds for the number of ranking patterns in the unidimensional case.