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Bandura’s Theory of Self-Efficacy
Theorist: Albert Bandura
Albert Bandura
Albert Bandura was born December 4, 1925 in Mundane, in Alberta, Canada. He studied
as an undergraduate at the University of British Columbia. By fluke, Bandura took an
introductory psychology course in order to take a full course load. He enjoyed the course so
much that he graduated in 1949 with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. Following his
undergraduate work, Bandura studied clinical psychology at the University of Iowa and obtained
a M.A. and Ph. D by 1952. He studied under Robert Sears at the University of Iowa and gained
an interest in social learning theory. Bandura joined the faculty at Stanford University in 1953.
Description of Theory
Overview
Albert Bandura’s theory of perceived self-efficacy is based on one’s belief of their
capabilities. Perceived self-efficacy influences every aspect of life. The following quote from
Bandura provides a brief synopsis of perceived self-efficacy.
“We find that people’s beliefs about their efficacy affect the sorts of choices they make
in very significant ways. In particular, it affects their levels of motivation and
perseverance in the face of obstacles. Most success requires persistent effort, so low selfefficacy becomes a self-limiting process. In order to succeed, people need a sense of selfefficacy, strung together with resilience to meet the inevitable obstacles and inequities of
life” (Bandura, 1977).
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Individuals with overall high perceived self-efficacy often set high goals and maintain
endurance to see them through despite challenges. They recover more quickly from failure and
attribute failure to lack of knowledge or skills, rather than deficits in personal capabilities. These
individuals typically achieve more in life, while experiencing lower levels of stress and
depression (Bandura, 1994).
Individuals with overall low perceived self-efficacy focus on personal deficiencies lack
of skills, and self-doubts. These individuals are hindered by obstacles which often results in
higher rates of failure. Individuals with low perceived self-efficacy tend to exert less effort, set
lower goals and experience less success. They are less likely to recover from setbacks and have
high rates of stress and depression (Bandura, 1994, 1982).
Individuals can have high perceived self-efficacy in some areas and low perceived selfefficacy in others. Self-efficacy is task specific and differs from one activity to another. For
example, a person may have high levels of perceived self-efficacy at work and low perceived
self-efficacy in the area of weight management. Self-efficacy has to be measured in individual
domains that examine perceived self-efficacy of specific tasks. An example of a measurement of
efficacy in exercise is provided in the Appendix.
In summary, “Self-efficacy judgments, whether accurate or faulty, influence choice of
activities and environmental settings. People avoid activities that they believe exceed their
coping capabilities, but they undertake and perform assuredly those that they judge themselves
capable of managing” (Bandura, 1977).
History
Bandura conducted a study on how an individual’s perception of their ability to control
what they perceive as threats affects the release of neurotransmitters and stress-related hormones
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into the bloodstream. The study resulted in individuals overcoming lifelong phobias within a
matter of a few hours. Study participants even put themselves in activities they once would never
have attempted because they felt they had more control of themselves. The overall findings of
this series of Bandura’s research was that one’s belief in their self-efficacy (e.g., belief in their
own capabilities) could help regulate personal actions. This research marked the beginning of
Bandura’s interest in and study of perceived self-efficacy.
Self-efficacy has been studied in a variety of diverse fields including business, athletics,
education, medicine, media studies, social and political change, moral development, psychology,
psychiatry, psycho-pathology, and international affairs. The field of education has conducted a
substantial amount of self-efficacy research in pursuit of learning how to help students achieve
more despite their ability, background, family circumstance, and adversity. Bandura’s theory of
self-efficacy was developed from research conducted by these diverse programs. The
culmination of perceived self-efficacy in these different fields resulted in a comprehensive
understanding .This body of research brought lucidity in how one’s perceived self-efficacy
allows them to take control of their life circumstances to ultimately impact the direction of their
lives and the person they become (Pajares, 2004).
Theory Components
One’s perceived efficacy affects how people think (e.g., erratic, strategic, optimistic,
pessimistic, etc.), choices they make, goals they set, commitment to goals, amount of effort put
forth, anticipated outcomes from their efforts, length of time they persevere during challenging
experiences, resilience to adversity, quality of emotional life, the amount of stress and depression
experienced in coping with demands of life, the life choices they make and accomplishments
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they recognize (Bandura, 2006). It is important understand the sources of self-efficacy and the
associated psychological processes.
Sources of Efficacy
According to Bandura (1994), there are four primary sources of perceived self-efficacy
which include mastery experiences, social modeling, social persuasion, and emotional states.
Each of these sources can promote both high and low self-efficacy. When one experiences
mastery of a task or activity, it can serve as a boost to self-efficacy. If one experiences mastery
too quickly or easily, one can tend to exert less effort and expect to achieve mastery immediately
without learning to work. The general tendency is the more someone experiences mastery, the
more likely they are to develop higher levels of self-efficacy.
Social models are a source of efficacy. Individuals are influenced by the capabilities of
others whom they perceive themselves to be most similar too. For example, a person who views
themselves as similar to someone who is highly capable in a certain area, may perceive
themselves equally as capable (i.e., “if she can do it, I can do it.). This can also be reversed to the
negative where one may perceive themselves incapable (i.e., “if she can’t do that, there is no way
I can). Social models serve as a standard for judging personal capabilities (Bandura, 1994).
Social persuasion is another source of efficacy that takes place when others believe an
individual is capable of a task. Individuals can perform up or down to others expectations and
beliefs. For example, students whose teachers label them as bad, often behave badly while
students who are believed to be “good” typically behave well.
Finally, emotional states are a source of efficacy. Emotions and mood affect the way a
person perceives their efficacy. People translate their reactions to emotion into performance
capabilities. The mood or emotion is not important as much as affect their reaction has on an
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individual’s perception of there self-efficacy. For example, an individual may not think he or she
has the emotional capacity to do a certain activity or task based on their previous reactions to
emotion or mood.
Psychological Processes of Perceived Self-Efficacy
In addition to sources of efficacy, Bandura (1994) suggested four psychological processes
of perception of self-efficacy that affect human performance (see Figure 1). These process
include cognitive, motivational, affective and selection. Cognitive processes involve the thought
process one goes through before engaging in a task. People imagine a scenario and anticipate
their capabilities and potential outcomes. Every task begins with a cognitive thought process.
Secondly, the motivational processes occurs when one gains motivation from causal
attributions, outcome expectancies and goals to attempt or perform a given task (Bandura, 1994).
Every action is motivated by something. Next individuals experience the affective process. The
affective process involves an individual’s perceived efficacy in their coping abilities and how
much stress they believe they are capable of handling in challenging or threatening
circumstances. The ultimate decision occurs in the selection process. People select activities
they feel they are capable of and avoid activities they perceive themselves to be incapable of
successfully completing. Each selection or life choice molds one’s life. Bandura (1994)
suggested individuals follow each of the discussed processes in decision making. Perceived selfefficacy is involved in every decision made.
Perceived self-efficacy is a belief of what one is capable of while outcome expectations
are beliefs about the outcomes that will likely follow a given performance (Bandura, 2006). “The
outcomes people anticipate depend largely on their judgments of how well they will be able to
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perform in given situations” (Bandura, 2006, p.309). This is obtained through the four processes
identified by Bandura.
Measurement and Instrumentation
It is not possible for an individual to have high levels of self-efficacy in each area of life.
Individuals have areas in which they have higher levels of self-efficacy than others. Bandura
(2006) gave an example of a business executive who had high levels of organizational efficacy
but low levels of parenting efficacy. There are multiple domains (e.g., exercise, diet, parental,
organizational, etc.) of self-efficacy that make up one’s general personal efficacy; therefore there
is no all encompassing self-efficacy measure. Such measurement would not provide adequate
information for any specific domain. Instruments that attempt to serve as an all-purpose measure
of self-efficacy have limited value because they do not encompass specific situations and
circumstances necessary for accurate measurement (Bandura, 2006). “Scales of perceived selfefficacy must be tailored to the particular domain of functioning that is the object of interest”
(Bandura, 2006, p. 307-308). Individual domain instruments must be created.
Bandura (2006) provided guidelines for developing self-efficacy scales in any given
domain. In measuring perceived self-efficacy for a specific domain, all behavioral aspects of the
domain must be considered. Bandura (2006) used the example of weight loss to explain. In
developing an instrument to measure one’s perceived capabilities to control weight, both diet and
exercise must be examined. If only diet was considered, this would not account for true success
in weight loss, only one part of the weightless process. All relevant aspects of a domain must be
considered to ensure a valid measurement.
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Including factors that do not influence a specific domain is of equal importance. For
example, one’s ability to relax does not affect weight loss. Any items in a scale that do not affect
the domain being measured and cannot be linked to the domain must be rewritten or discarded.
Instruments measuring perceived self-efficacy must include a level of challenge one
perceives they are capable of attaining. This may be measured by level of perceived, accuracy,
exertion, productivity, threat, self-regulation, etc. One self-efficacy scale Bandura developed
measured one’s perceived capabilities to exercise under certain circumstances (i.e., stressed,
tired, under pressure from work, etc.; see Appendix). His measurement scale was in increments
of 10 from 0 to 100 with 0 measuring “cannot do at all”, 50 measuring “moderately can do”, and
100 measuring “highly certain can do” (Bandura, 2006, p. 321). When developing self-efficacy
scales, researchers must identify challenges that keep individuals from performing a specific
behavior. For example, some individuals may perceive themselves as less capable of maintaining
an exercise routine during rainy weather. Researchers can identify these challenges by
conducting pilot studies with open ended questions that ask participants to describe things that
make it challenging to perform a specific behavior. The identified challenges can be built into the
efficacy measure. A more encompassing scale can be developed from this practice. When the
scale is formally given, participants can rate their ability to meet or surpass a given barrier.
The response scale for measuring self-efficacy should require individuals to rate the
strength of their belief in their current capabilities to do a specific activity at the time of the
measurement. Scales can be from 0 to 100 with increments of 10 or from 1 to 10 depending on
the age and ability of participants. A 5 interval scale is weaker than using a 0-100 scale (Pajares,
Hartley, & Valiante, 2001) because it does not allow responses to be distributed over a range.
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A practice item is recommended to ensure that participants recognize they should rate
themselves according to what their capabilities are at the time the measurement is given. This
must be emphasized to avoid participants rating how they perceive themselves to be in the future.
Raters may mistakenly rate themselves higher with the hopes that they will one day be capable of
a certain behavior or task. Bandura recommends a practice item on the capability to lift objects
of a certain weight. At a certain point an individual can determine they are incapable of lifting a
certain amount of weight. This helps to train the participant in how to properly rate perceived
self-efficacy. There are activities children can do to learn how to rate themselves. Bandura
(2006) recommended placing markers at different distances from the child, have them rate their
beliefs of if they can jump a certain distance to a marker. Once a child has rated their capability,
the child attempts to jump as far as the marker. This activity can help train children in rating
perceived self-efficacy behaviors.
Bias
Bandura recommended safeguard procedures to help prevent bias in responses. First, he
recommended use of standard procedures. Measurement instructions should not require personal
identification and participants should be informed that the instrument will be coded and only
reviewed by researchers. This helps decrease respondent evaluation concerns.
Second, Bandura recommended to generically title measurements (e.g., “Appraisal
Inventory”) rather than the title containing the word self-efficacy. According to Bandura, they
are more likely to respond truthfully if they feel they are helping contribute to research efforts
rather than personally being evaluated.
Items
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After developing a self-efficacy scale, Bandura suggests pretesting each item. Items that
are vague should be rewritten or discarded (Bandura, 2006). Items that the majority of
respondents rate the highest possible efficacy indicates an item does not show enough challenge.
In this case, the item should be discarded or changed to increase the level of challenge so that
difference between respondents will show.
Homogeneity of items must be confirmed through conducting a factor analyses.
Cronbach’s alpha should be conducted to examine internal consistency reliabilities (Bandura,
2006). When reliability coefficients are low, items with low correlates should be discarded or
rewritten. Increasing the number of items will provide a more efficient alpha level.
Conclusion
Bandura’s Theory of Self-Efficacy is widely researched in a number of fields and has
been used to help individuals achieve despite all obstacles. The power of this theory is that no
one is exempt from perceived self-efficacy. Perceived self-efficacy affects all individuals in
every aspect of life. Self-efficacy is not limited to a particular field and therefore can benefit and
impact many people in a variety of professions.
Report Prepared by: Carrie Allday
References
Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change.
Psychological Review, 84, 191-215.
Bandura, A. (1982). Self-efficacy mechanism in human agency. American Psychologist, 37(2),
122-147.
Bandura, A. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory.
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
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Bandura, A. (1994). Self-efficacy. In V.S. Ramachaudran (Ed.), Encyclopedia of human
behavior (Vol. 4, pp. 71-81). New York: Academic Press.
Bandura, A. (2006). Guide for constructing self-efficacy scales. In F. Pajares & T. Urdan (Eds.)
Self-efficacy beliefs of adolescents. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.
Pajares, F. (2004). Albert Bandura: Biographical sketch. Retrieved September 26, 2010,
from http://des.emory.edu/mfp/bandurabio.html
Pajares, F., Hartley, J., & Valiante, G. (2001). Response format in writing self-efficacy
assessment: Greater discrimination increases predication. Measurement and Evaluation
in Counseling and Development, 33, 214-221.
SELF EFFICACY THEORY
Figure 1
Bandura’s Theory of Self-Efficacy
(Bandura, 1986, p.169)
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Appendix
Self-Efficacy to Regulate Exercise
A number of situations are described below that can make it hard to
stick to an exercise routine. Please rate in each of the blanks in the column how certain you are that you can get yourself to perform your exercise routine regularly (three or more times a week).
Rate your degree of confidence by recording a number from 0 to 100 using
the
scale given below:
0
10
20
30
Cannot
do at all
40
50
60
Moderately
can do
70
80
90
100
Highly certain
can do
Confidence
(0-100)
_____
When I am feeling tired
When I am feeling under pressure from work
_____
During bad weather
_____
After recovering from an injury that caused me to stop exercising
_____
During or after experiencing personal problems
_____
When I am feeling depressed
_____
When I am feeling anxious
_____
After recovering from an illness that caused me to stop exercising
_____
When I feel physical discomfort when I exercise
_____
After a vacation
_____
When I have too much work to do at home
_____
When visitors are present
_____
When there are other interesting things to do
_____
If I don’t reach my exercise goals
_____
Without support from my family or friends
_____
During a vacation
_____
When I have other time commitments
_____
After experiencing family problems
_____