Socio-Cult: Social Cognitive Theory SCT

Question 1

whats social cognitive theory

Answer 1

assumes that humans can learn behaviors through observational learning, meaning individuals don’t have to experience everything themselves.

1) modeling: we learn by IMITATING the behavior of others particularly those we admire or IDENTIFY with (gender, age, etc)

2) self-efficacy: our ability to replicate the action makes us more likely

3) vicarious reinforcement: consequences to an action -> less likely to imitate and vice versa with rewards

Question 2

RESEARCHER AND AIM

Answer 2

Bandura et al : SCT in observational learning of aggression by children

Question 3

PROCEDURE

Answer 3

There were 72 participants 1:1 ratio of male and female.

1F 1M acted as models.
3 main conditions;
control group (no models), AGGRESSIVE model, and PASSIVE model.
The groups broken down into 6 children of the SAME-SEX and exposed to either the aggressive condition or non-aggressive condition, with or without same-sex models in each condition.

The non-aggressive: the model plays with the other dolls, ignoring the Bobo doll.
aggressive: the model first played with the other toys and then aggressively played with the Bobo doll. Aggression was displayed physically and verbally.

the child was taken to a room with non-aggressive toys and the Bobo doll.

Question 4

RESULTS

Answer 4

children who saw the aggressive model made more aggressive acts than children who saw the non-aggressive model.
Additionally, when the model was the same sex, the children showed MORE aggression.
The boys showed more aggression than the girls, but the girls punched the Bobo more than the guys.

Question 5

CONCLUSION

Answer 5

This study shows how behavior can be learned by observing models. This supports SCT.
The children in the aggressive condition became more aggressive toward the Bobo doll than the non-aggressive condition after seeing how the adults treated it. They also develop new ways to be “aggressive” towards the Bobo. Bandura’s study also highlighted that if the child identified more with the model (in this case same sex), the higher the likelihood they would copy the model’s behavior, which is one of the factors explained earlier. Secondly, the models were aggressive in a scripted way which shows how consistency played a role in the child copying the behavior.