Social Psychological approaches to explaining aggression Flashcards
Social learning theory
Social learning theory is a theory for how we learn; it can help to explain many different behaviours, such as forming relationships and how to behave in a new job. It can also be used to explain aggressive behaviour
-Its about observation of behaviour
Bandura theory
- Bandura and others believed that social learning could explain how children develop aggressive and violent behaviours.
- Basically children observe the actions of significant others (usually adults) and model their own behaviour on what they see, often imitating specific behaviours.
- One context for this could be a child observing their parents’ response to being frustrated, annoyed or threatened by someone – if it is an aggressive response the child stores it as a mental representation and uses it as a model for their own behaviour in similar situations.
SLT bandura for television
-Alternatively the child might watch TV programmes or DVD films in which adults behave aggressively or violently, and the TV character becomes the ‘role model’ for the child’s own behaviour.
Bandura original (1961)
Bandura et al original (1961) experiment when the children generally imitated whichever behaviour they had seen modelled, including specific imitation of violent acts.
- The fact that the children learned by vicarious experience (rather than direct experience) was important because it showed that they could learn a whole range of aggressive responses simply by being witness to such behaviours going on around them.
- This original experiment also showed that observational learning of aggression is more potent in males than females, and when the role model is of the same gender – so the status of the model is important.
What did the Bandura original show about gender?
-This original experiment also showed that observational learning of aggression is more potent in males than females, and when the role model is of the same gender – so the status of the model is important.
Bandura et al 1963
-Bandura et al’s experiment in 1963 demonstrated one key thing about learning aggression: observing a role model’s aggressive behaviour will lead to the child ‘learning’ (processing and remembering) the behaviour, but imitation is far more likely to occur if the child feels sufficiently motivated to do so, and a key motivation is the prospect of being rewarded.
Vicarious reinforcement
- Children’s vicarious experience of an aggressive act being rewarded is sufficient enough reinforcement for them to want to imitate the behaviour themselves: the children who observed the model being rewarded were far more likely to imitate the behaviour on their own than those who observed punishment or no consequence.
- All children could accurately reproduce the model’s behaviour when rewarded for doing so (they had ‘learned’ the behaviour).
Retention
‘Mental representation’ is synonymous with retention. Retention will occur if they pay attention to the models behaviour
Bandura et al (1963) supports the theory because…
-Those children who observed no reward or punishment and those who observed reward, were the most aggressive. Those who observed the punishment were the least aggressive
This supports the theory because (vicarious observational learning)
-When the children watch the aggressive behaviour they are vicariously reinforced as the model being aggressive has either no consequences for their actions or is rewards for the aggressive behaviour. So once the child has observed and retained the behaviour, they will then be motivated to repeat the behaviour if they know they will be rewarded or have no consequences
The theory relies on experimental evidence which may lack ecological validity… (specify which features are artificial)
This is because the bobo doll is not a living person and does not react or retaliate when it’s hit, therefore the model is unrealistic and the children may know that they can hit a doll without it having consequences, so they will repeat the action they saw. Therefore not a realistic representation of aggression.
Robertson et al.
Objective: To investigate whether excessive television viewing throughout adolescence is associated with antisocial behaviour in early adulthood.
Method: We assessed a birth cohort of 1037 individuals born in Dunedin, New Zealand, in 1972–1973, at regular intervals from birth to age 26 years. We correlated the associations between television viewing hours from ages 5 to 15 years and four variables: criminal convictions, violent convictions, diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, and aggressive personality traits in early adulthood.
Results of Robertson et al.
RESULTS: Young adults who had spent more time watching television during childhood and adolescence were significantly more likely to have a criminal conviction, a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, and more aggressive personality traits compared with those who viewed less television. The associations were statistically significant after controlling for sex, IQ, socioeconomic status, previous antisocial behavior, and parental control. The associations were similar for both sexes.
Conclusions of Robertson et al.
CONCLUSIONS: Excessive television viewing in childhood and adolescence is associated with increased antisocial behaviour in early adulthood. The findings are consistent with a causal association and support the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendation that children should watch no more than 1 to 2 hours of television each day.
Strengths of Robertson et al.
The strength of this evidence is that, although it only demonstrates a correlation, they did a kind of matched pairs analysis in which they compared people who were similar in terms of sex, IQ, socioeconomic status, previous antisocial behaviour and parental control. Therefore there can be no ‘other reasons’ for the correlation between TV viewing and later aggression.
Paik & Comstock
And finally a meta analysis by Paik & Comstock in 1994 found a strong effect size for the effect of television violence on aggressive behaviour. They also found that it affects males and females equally.
Evaluation of strengths of support
The triangulated results from a lab experiment so well controlled, a longitudinal correlation (with controls) and a meta analysis so general trend, which makes it strong and reliable evidence for the role of social learning in aggression.
IDA: Practical application
- The benefit of a social learning approach to aggression is that it can be used to try to reduce aggression in real life.
- Robertson et al found that excessive television viewing in childhood is associated with increased antisocial behaviour, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend that children watch no more than 1 to 2 hours a day - therefore parents can use this guideline to reduce their child’s chances of developing antisocial behaviour.
IDA: Why does the !Kung San community represent evidence that the social learning theory is good at explaining cultural differences?
- The ‘culture of violence theory b Wolfgang et al proposes that some cultures emphasise and model aggression, while others emphasise non-aggressive behaviour and therefore produce individuals of low levels of aggression.
- For stance the Kung San people of Kalahari Desert, aggression is comparatively rare. Parents to not use physical punishment and aggression is devalued by the society as a whole.
- There absence of aggression means there is little opportunity to learn aggressive behaviour; absence of aggressive models.
IDA: 2. What argument is given against the idea that aggression can be explained in purely biological terms as a hormonal imbalance?
- Biological explanations stress factors unrelated to SL
- High levels of the male hormone testosterone may also cause aggression, casting doubt on aggression being purely learnt behaviour.
- However, the Pygmies of central Africa- very little aggression takes place.
- Deaux et el point out that they lack the an aggressive male stereotype.
- These cultures clearly have the same biological sex differences, so it must be a lack of aggressive male model
- Suggests social learning is more important than biological.
- Also shows SLT is a good explanation of cultural differences
Deindividuation definition
Deindividuation refers to the process of decreased self- assessment and awareness that occurs when identification of an individual is difficult or impossible.
Deindividuation AO1
As Postmes (2005): “Deindividuation theory was developed to explain the violence and irrationality of the crowd. According to deindividuation theory, the anonymity and excitement of the crowd makes individuals lose a sense of individual identity. As a result, crowd members cease to evaluate themselves—they become irrational and irresponsible. All this make the crowd fickle and explosive, and prone to anti-normative and disinhibited behaviour.”
AO1: Festinger 1952
Individuals in a group do not pay attention to others as individuals, and correspondingly they do not feel that they are being singled out by others. They forego their individual identity, shedding the associated norms of behaviour, and instead ‘merge’ with the crowd.
AO1: Zimbardo 1969
This adoption of a group identity (rather than individual) results in individuals feeling anonymous, relieved of their self-awareness.
- Such anonymity means they are not bound by the norms of wider society, thus more primitive urges are more likely to be acted upon.
- The feeling of anonymity makes group members less likely to be identified and punished individually, thus reducing their inhibitions further.
