Bandura (1965)

Question 1

What were the aims of this Bandura study?

Answer 1

• To see if reinforcing consequences to the model would result in significant differences in the performance of imitative behaviour
• To see if rewarded models would display the highest performance differences in matching responses

Question 2

Who were used in the sample?

Answer 2

66 boys and girls with a mean age of 51 months from Stanford University nursery school.

Question 3

What type of method was used?

Answer 3

Lab

Question 4

What were the 3 different conditions?

Answer 4

1) Model rewarded
2) Model punished
3) No consequences to the model

Question 5

What were the 3 IVs?

Answer 5

1) Condition children were exposed to
2) Gender of the child
3) Gender of the adult

Question 6

What were the 2 DVs?

Answer 6

1) Number of different verbal imitative responses reproduced

2) Number of different physical imitative responses reproduced

Question 7

What were the 3 stages of this experiment?

Answer 7

1) Exposure procedure
2) Performance measure
3) Acquisition index

Question 8

Briefly describe the ‘exposure procedure’ stage of this study.

Answer 8

• Children watched a 5 min film of a model acting aggressively towards a Bobo doll
• Four responses were each accompanied with verbalisation
• For example the model would hit the Bobo doll with a mallet and say “sockeroo… stay down” as the verbalisation that followed it
• The sequence of physically and verbally aggressive behaviour was repeated twice
• Children in the reward condition were exposed to a closing scene of the model receiving a chocolate bar as positive reinforcement
• Children in the punishment condition were exposed to a closing scene of the model being told they were a “big bully” and that if they didn’t stop they would receive a “spanking”
• Children in the no consequences condition were shown no reinforcement at the end

Question 9

Briefly describe the ‘performance measure’ stage of this study.

Answer 9

• After the exposure procedure children were taken to a room that contained the Bobo doll and other toys such as guns and a dolls house
• The child was told they could play with any of the toys
• They spent 10 mins, being recorded every 5 seconds in terms of predetermined imitative response categories
• The number of different physical and verbal imitative responses performed spontaneously constituted the performance measure

Question 10

Briefly describe the ‘acquisition index’ stage of this study.

Answer 10

• At the end of the 10 mins the experiment walked back in with a fruit juice and a book of stickers
• They informed the children that for each physical and verbal imitative response they reproduced they would receive a sticker and more juice
• The experimenter put a picture on the wall and said they would be interested to see how many stickers the child could get on the picture
• The experimenter then asked the child, “show me what Rocky did in the TV program, tell me what he said”
• The children were rewarded with a sticker and juice after following each matched response

Question 11

What were the results of Bandura’s study?

Answer 11

• Boys performed more matched responses than girls
• After positive incentive there was a significant increase in matched responses performed from no incentive for girls and boys
• Girls in the model punished condition performed 0.5 matched responses compared to boys who performed 2.5

Question 12

Describe the conclusions of this experiment.

Answer 12

• After viewing the film children imitated the aggressive behaviour
• Those in the model rewarded or no consequences condition were more willing to imitate due to not having seen anything bad happen as a result

Question 13

Evaluate the generalisablity using a high and low point.

Answer 13

P - High
E - Used sample of 66 boys and girls
E - Large sample representing both genders
P - Low
E - Used sample of children
E - This limits the ability to represent older ages such as teenagers

Question 14

Evaluate the reliability using 2 high points.

Answer 14

P - High
E - Standardised procedure observing children for 10 mins at 5 second intervals
E - Making the study easily replicable to test for consistency of results
P - High inter-rater
E - Researchers agreed 99% of the timeand looked for predetermined responses
E - Increasing the objectivity of results

Question 15

Are there any applications?

Answer 15

P - Yes
E - Highlights how children are less likely to imitate the behaviour of role models if they are punished
E - Helps parenting by showing punishments to children of their role models to stop any undesirable behaviour being reproduced

Question 16

Evaluate the validity using 2 low points.

Answer 16

P - Low
E - Children had never seen a Bobo doll before so maybe they thought they were supposed to hit it
E - Therefore no cause and effect could be established because they thought that was how you play with it rather than actually being aggressive
P - Low ecological
E - Carried out in an artificial environment where the model and the child were strangers
E - Doesn’t represent how children would observe and imitate behaviour in real life

Question 17

Evaluate an ethical issue.

Answer 17

P - Unethical
E - The children were deliberately encouraged to be aggressive with no talk of removing that aggression
E - And so children may have been aggressive after the study which they should have countered by showing a pro-social role model to calm them down