Social learning theory Flashcards
what is aggression?
any hostile behaviour that is intended to cause harm to another person/persons.
What are the 2 ways in which people learn aggressive behaviour/
Direct experience
Vicarious learning
what is direct experience?
Operant conditioning- a child pushes a boy, gets reward which reinforces action and hence will be more likely to happen again.
What is vicarious learning?
Watching others being reinforced and punished and then imitating the behaviour. By observing the consequences they learn what is considered appropriate and whether it is worth repeating.
What are the 3 stages called Bandura suggested people go through before aggressive behaviour takes place
Observation
Mental representation
Maintenance through direct experience OR self-efficacy expectancies
What is observation?
Watching others’s behaviour and whether they are punished or rewarded.
What is mental representation?
Forming mental representations and then representing possible rewards and punishments for their aggressive behaviour in terms of expectancies of future outcomes. When appropriate opportunities arise, the behaviour is shown as long as the expectation of the reward id greater than the expectation of the punishment.
what is maintenance through direct experience/
if the child is rewarded, they are likely to repeat the behaviour in similar situations.
what is self-efficacy expectancies?
Watching aggressive behavior and deciding whether your own ability can compete with the aggressive behaviour.
The BoBo dolls study
Some children were exposed to adult models interacting aggressively with a life-sized bobo doll and half weren’t. They were frustrated and then taken to a room full of toys including the bobo doll. The children in the aggressive condition showed verbal and physical aggression towards the doll.
The Bobo dolls study-evaluation
X Demand characteristics could have taken place. It was reported one of the children was seen telling their mum that ‘there are the dolls we are supposed to hit’ reducing it’s validity. HOWEVER when the study was repeated this time with live clowns, the children still showed aggressiveness towards them, increasing it’s validity.
-/ It can explain aggressive behaviour in the absence of direct reinforcement. At no point were the children rewarded. The concept of vicarious learning is apparent.
Can the bobo dolls study be applied to adults?
Daily homicide rates in the US increased normally after a major boxing match, indicating people were imitating the behaviour they watched, supporting social learning theory can be applied to adults.
Media violence
Children watched a video of a toy being hidden in another room and asked to find it. They found it and hence suggests they learned to reproduce the behaviours they saw and so suggests children could do the same with violence on tv.
how can social learning theory be used to explain cultural differences?
In some cultures, aggressive behaviour is very rare. This is due to the absence of direct reinforcement of aggressive behaviour. Instead of rewarding or punishing aggressive behaviour, parents separate them and try to distract their attention. The absence of aggressive models mean there is little motivation for aggressive behaviour to be acquired.
What evaluation point supports mental representation?
Context-dependent learning: This is where people respond differently to different situations because they have observed the aggression is rewarded in some situations and punished in others. Supporting that aggressive behaviour is learnt.
