Social Learning
Theory of
Personality
Srinjoy Ghosh
Mind Jog
How much does the environment influence our
behaviour?
How much do we influence the environment?
Personal Connect
Think about the questions below and
discuss:
➔ Do you have fear of snakes?
➔ Is this fear a part of your
personality? Is this fear learnt
from the environment?
➔ Is it possible to control this fear?
Meet Albert Bandura
Professor of Psychology at Stanford
University
Proposed the famous theory of Social
Learning
The theory provides a framework for
understanding how people actively
shape and are shaped by their
environment.
ARE AGGRESSION AND
VIOLENCE LEARNED
BEHAVIOURS?
In a famous and
influential experiment
known as the Bobo doll
experiment, Albert
Bandura and his
colleagues
demonstrated one way
that children learn
aggression.
The Bobo Experiment
Participants would observe an adult
behaving in a violent manner towards
a Bobo doll toy. The toys, which were
popular during the 1960s, feature an
image of a clown and were designed to
Children in one of these groups were
placed in a room in which they
witnessed an adult hitting a Bobo doll
in an aggressive manner. They were
later given the opportunity to play
with the dolls for themselves.
Results
➔ the group of children who had
observed an adult behaving
violently towards the toy were
more likely to act aggressively
towards it themselves when
given the opportunity.
➔ learning takes place not only
when individuals are rewarded
or punished for their own
behavior, but also when they
observe another person called
observational learning.
Now let us watch the
experiment
CONCLUSION
Social Learning impacts learning,
thought and behaviour
Involves an individual observing
behaviour of people around them
Children imitate behaviours of adults
Seeing others being rewarded or
punished leads to evaluation of one’s
own behaviour.
Vicarious learning also known as
observational learning or
learning through modeling
occurs when an individual learns
something simply through
observation without direct
reinforcement or punishment of
the behavior, i.e., vicariously
Example
Learning to whistle after
watching someone else
shape their lips and
expel air is an example
of Vicarious learning.
The component processes underlying observational learning are:
(1) Attention: The extent to which we are exposed/notice the behavior. For a
behavior to be imitated, it has to grab our attention. We observe many
behaviors on a daily basis, and many of these are not noteworthy.
(2) Retention: How well the behavior is remembered. The behavior may be
noticed but is it not always remembered which obviously prevents imitation.
(3) Motor Reproduction: This is the ability to perform the behavior that the
model has just demonstrated. We see much behavior on a daily basis that we
would like to be able to imitate but that this not always possible.
(4) Motivation: The will to perform the behavior. The rewards and punishment
that follow a behavior will be considered by the observer.
Self Efficacy
● The term self-efficacy refers to an individual's confidence in their ability to
complete a task or achieve a goal. The concept was originally developed by
Albert Bandura.
● According to Bandura, there are two factors that influence whether or not
someone engages in a particular behavior: outcome expectancy and selfefficacy.
● In other words, our ability to achieve a goal or complete a task depends on
whether we think we can do it (self-efficacy), and whether we think it will
have good results (outcome expectancy).
Reciprocal
Determinism
Bandura believed in “reciprocal
determinism”, that is, the world and
a person’s behavior cause each
other.
Bandura soon considered
personality as an interaction
between three components: the
environment, behavior, and one’s
psychological processes (one’s
ability to entertain images in minds
and language).
We also make judgments about our
own capabilities by watching others.
Self Efficacy &
Observation
Our self-efficacy for a given activity
is more likely to increase when we
see someone else succeed at that
activity through hard work, rather
than natural ability.
Think: How our role models have
helped us in our self-efficacy?
Good luck!