Albert Bandura

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Albert Bandura

• Social Learning Theory

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Social Learning Theory

• The idea that people learn from one another
  through observation, imitation, and modeling
• Reciprocal Determinism The environment and a
  persons behavior cause and reinforce each other.

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Component Processes

• Attention
• Retention
• Motor Reproduction
• Motivation

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Attention

• Different factors increase or decrease amount of
  attention paid, such as
• Distinctiveness of action
• Affective valence
• Complexity
• Functional value

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Attention cont.

• Individual characteristics also affect attention
• Sensory capacities
• Arousal level
• Perceptual set
• Past reinforcement

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Retention

• Remembering what you paid attention to,
  including
• Symbolic coding
• Mental images
• Cognitive organization
• Symbolic rehearsal
• Motor rehearsal

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Reproduction

• Reproducing the image
• Physical capabilities
• Self-observation of reproduction

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Motivation

• Having a good reason to imitate the action.
  Motives include
• Past (traditional behaviorism)
• Promised (imagined incentives)
• Vicarious (seeing and recalling the reinforced
  model)

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Principles of Social Learning

• Highest level of observational learning is first
  organizing and rehearsing modeled behavior
  symbolically, then reenacting it overtly.
• Individuals are more likely to adopt a modeled
  behavior if it results in valued outcomes
• Individuals are more likely to adopt a modeled
  behavior if the model is similar to the observer,
  has admired status, and the behavior has
  functional value

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Bobo Doll Experiment (1961)
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Method

• Selected children between 3-6 years old, evenly
  distributed between sexes
• Children placed individually in a room w/ toys
• 3 Groups
• Control no adult present with children, children
  just played with toys provided for 10 minutes
• Group 2 adult would verbally and physically
  attack bobo doll
• Group 3 adult played peacefully along with
  children

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Method Cont.

• Children were then taken to another room filled
  with toys that they were not allowed to play with
• Intended to build their frustration
• Children taken to a third room with aggressive
  and non-aggressive toys as well as the bobo doll

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Behavioral Factors Measured

• Physical Aggression
• Hitting doll with mallet, punching, kicking,
  sitting on doll
• Verbal Aggression
• General abuse
• Imitation of phrases used by adult model
• Other uses of mallet
• Aggression that was not a direct imitation of
  adult model

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Results

• Children exposed to non-aggressive model were
  less likely to display aggression
• Children exposed to aggressive model were more
  likely to display aggression
• Both physical and verbal
• Boys 3X more likely to display physical
  aggression than girls
• Verbal aggression levels were not significantly
  different by gender

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Results

• Aggression may be a learned behavior
• Suggests that avoiding displays of aggression may
  reduce the liklihood of violent tendencies in
  children
• Still cited in debates about the effects of
  violence in video games, movies, television, etc.