Bandura's Theory

Bandura’s Social Cognitive Theory

Albert Bandura was a psychologist working in the late 1950s, the last years of Behaviorism's dominance of American psychology. He could see that the prevailing behavioral paradigm failed to explain a lot of phenomena. Specifically, he could see that people learned by watching others. For instance when people watched a movie star say a certain phrase, those people would imitate that phrase. But behaviorism essentially could not explain how this learning could occur. In fact, those using behavioral view would predict that a person would not copy something he saw, because he was not being reinforced for that behavior!

Bandura set about experimenting, and later theorizing about what people could learn by watching others. His theory has seen a great deal of change since his first “Bobo doll” studies in 1961 (Bandura, Ross, & Ross, 1961), and it has grown more to involve more and cognition with each revision. The first version was called “Vicarious Reinforcement” and focused on the ability of an observer to be reinforced by watching another person reinforced. That idea was later changed into observational learning, where Bandura stressed the importance of aspects of the observer, such as attention, and aspects of the model, such as  attractiveness or power. Later, in the 1970s, he added the concept of “self-efficacy” to make his theory far more cognitive. He termed this theory “Social Learning Theory” and described how this cognitive aspect, self-efficacy, could predict behavior better than could simple reinforcement. Self-efficacy is the observer's evaluation of her or his ability to copy the modeled behavior. So I might watch a professional athlete play her sport, and watch her carefully (attention), and see her attractiveness because of her fame, but I still do not imitate her behavior, because I don't think I can do what she does, which means I have low level of self-efficacy for that behavior. I may have high self-efficacy for other behaviors but not for that one. Lastly, in 1986, he made the theory into one using reciprocal effects from three different sources- the Person, the Environment, and the person's Behavior. He calls this theory “Social Cognitive Theory.” In this “agentic” theory, the individual is an “agent,” able to intentionally make changes to his or her life (Bandura, 2006)  This theory is the best theory (of the ones provided in this course) for learning and behavior change.

Below is a graphical representation, adapted from Bandura's work (Wood & Bandura, 1989).

The Model Explained

Aspects of the Person, their previous Behavior, and the social and physical Environment will affect whether or not someone does a behavior. Each of these aspects affect each other, and are affected by each other- that's the reciprocity in the model, represented by arrows in both directions.

The Parts of the Model

Behavior- this aspect represents what the person actually does. “Motor responses” means “actions.” This one is difficult for anyone to change, other than the person who is trying to change themselves.

Environment- this aspect is the world around the person. It involves the physical surroundings but also the social environment too. Research has shown this aspect to be far more powerful than most people would realize. A simple example is school- simply being in a classroom elicits certain behaviors from people- they sit down, are often quiet, prepare to take notes, etc. Those responses are mostly unique to the school environment! The famous Stanford Prison Experiment also showed the power of this Aspect- ordinary college students became brutal “guards” in a fake prison built in the basement of a building at Stanford University, during the anti-establishment early 1970s.

Person- this aspect represents what the person themselves brings to the situation. This includes beliefs and attitudes, cognitive skills (like math or problem-solving), and physical attributes also. So a person who stands 5' tall and weighs 90 lbs. is unlikely to play center on their high school football team, and this choice is due to his physical attributes. But that same person's intelligence (and encouragement from people in the Environment) might result in him getting a Ph.D. in Psychology.

If I want to change my behavior, or learn some new behavior, I'd want to change at least one, preferably all three of these aspects in some way. Each of the aspects influences the others, so a person who goes to the gym a lot and works out (change in Environment and Behavior) may change their physical attributes (Person), and a person who reads up on a subject (Behavior) might change their attitudes and beliefs about a topic (Person).

So, if I wanted to lose weight, one of the first things I'd do is to try to persuade myself that weight loss is a good idea. This is changing the Person, by changing my beliefs. I would also change the Environment, by removing junk food from my house and replacing it with easily-accessed healthy foods, like carrots or broccoli. I would also change my Environment by  hanging out with people who also are doing healthy things, and by going to the gym. Finally, I'd change my Behavior- I'd carry vegetable snacks around so I'd have healthy things to snack on. I'd also arrange exercise in a convenient way, perhaps by using a bicycle to commute to work instead of driving.

References

Bandura, A. (2006). Going global with social cognitive theory: From prospect to paydirt. In S. I. Donaldson, D. E. Berger, & K. Pezdek (Eds.). Applied psychology: New frontiers and rewarding careers (pp. 53-79). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.  Retrieved from: http://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/BanduraPubs/Bandura2006Global.pdf Links to an external site.  6/13/13.

Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological Review, 84, 2, 191-215. Retrieved from http://www.ou.edu/cls/online/LSPS5133/pdfs/bandura.pdf Links to an external site.  on 6/13/13.

Bandura, A., Ross, D., & Ross, S. A. (1961). Transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive models. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 63, 575-582.

Wood, R. & Bandura, A. (1989). Social cognitive theory of organizational management. Academy of Management Review, 14, 361-384. Retrieved from: http://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/BanduraPubs/Bandura1989AMR.pdf Links to an external site.  on 6/13/13.