SOCIAL COGNITIVE THEORY

OBJECTIVES

After the lesson the students will learn to:

•Describe the approach of Social Cognitive

Theory.
•Identify the process and function of
observational learning.
•Assess the effect of observational learning
into person’s life and its society.
Overview Of Social Cognitive Theory
Bandura’s Several Basic
Assumptions.

•Humans have the flexibility to learn

a variety of behavior in diverse
situations. He called human
characteristics plasticity.

•Through triadic reciprocal

causation model that includes
behavioral, environment and
personal factors, people have the
capacity to regulate their lives.

•Social Cognitive Theory takes an

agentic perspective, meaning that
humans have capacity to exercise
control over the nature and quality of
their lives.
Cont. Overview Of Social Cognitive Theory
•People regulate their conduct through both
external and internal factors.

•People find themselves in morally ambiguous

situations, they typically attempt to regulate
their behavior through moral agency.

In 1961, he conducted a study to investigate if

social behavior (e.i aggression) can be acquired
by observation and imitation.
THE BOBO DOLL EXPERIMENT

He selects 36 samples from

Stanford University Nursery
School aged 3-6 years old and
pre-tested the children for
how aggressive they were by
observing the children in the
nursery and judged their
aggressive behavior on four 5-
point rating scales.
Afterward, he uses lab experiment in which the
independent variable (type of model) was
manipulated in three conditions:

•Aggressive model shown to 24 children

•Non-aggressive model shown to 24 children
•No model shown (control condition) 24 children
The experiment show the following results
Aggressive model made far more imitative
aggressive responses than those who were in the
non-aggressive or control groups.
The girls in the aggressive model condition also
showed more physical aggressive responses if the
model was male, but more verbally aggressive if the
model was female.
Children imitate same sex model.
Boys imitated more physically aggressive acts than
girls.
Therefore, Bandura conclude that children learn
social behavior such as aggression through the
process of observation learning-through watching
the behavior of another person.
How this happen?

Modeling

The core for observational learning is

modeling. Learning through modeling involves
adding and subtracting from the observed behavior
and generalizing form one observation to another.
It involves cognitive processes and is not simply
mimicry or imitation. It is more than the actions of
another; it involves symbolically representing
information and storing it for use at a future time
(Bandura 1986, 1994).
Some factors that determine whether a person
will learn from a model:

1.The characteristics of the model are

important. People are more likely to model high
status, competent and powerful individuals.
2. The characteristics of the observer affect
the likelihood of modeling. People who lack
status, skill or power, children and resources
are likely model.
3. The consequences of the behavior being
modeled may have an effect on the observer.
Mediational Processes of Modeling
Attention
Before we can model another person, we
must attend to that person. Attractive models
are more likely to be observed than the
unattractive ones.
Representation/Retention
In order for observation to lead to
new response patterns, those patterns
must be symbolically represented in
memory.
Behavioral Production
After attending to a model and
retaining what we have observed, we
then produce the behavior.
Motivation
Observational learning is most
effective when learners are motivated to
perform the modeled behavior. Attention and
representation can lead acquisition of
learning, but performance facilitated by
motivation to enact the particular behavior.
Enactive Learning
Allows people to acquire new patterns of
complex behavior through direct experience by
thinking about and evaluating the consequences
of their behaviors. The learning process allows
people to have some degree of control over the
events that shape the course of their lives.
In order to succeed, people need a
sense of self-efficacy, to struggle
together with resilience to meet
the inevitable obstacles and
inequities of life.
-Albert Bandura
Thank you

Prepared By: Annabelle L. Generalao DPE

CAD Monday (6-9 PM)
Ms. Marili B. Cardillo Associate Professor I