Core Studies: Bandura

• What is the key theme

  external influences on children’s behaviour
• What is the approach

  developmental
• What does it study

  classic study of transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive role models
• Bandura’s background part 1


  1. B interested in examining social learning theory which is belief we can learn through mere observation and imitation of a role model who you identify with, p will store beh away and use it at an appropriate time
• Bandura’s background part 2


  2. Prev research by Bandura & Hudson: children will imitate beh demonstrated by adult role model if model remains present in situation

  3. prev research fails to assess this experimentally to see the level of aggression imitated by children in the absence of prev observed role model
• Bandura’s aim


  demonstrate learning can occur through mere observation of a role model and imitation of learned beh can occur even if absence of role model
• 3 hypotheses


  1. kids shown aggressive role models will show sig more imitative aggressive acts than kids shown non-agg r.m/no r.m
  2. boys will imitate more aggression than girls
  3. kids will imitate the same-sex role model more than the opposite sex role model
• What’s research method 


  lab exp with matched ps and ind measure
• sample 


  72 girls and boys av age 52 months from Stanford uni nursery school who fitted his criteria
• Procedure before rooms


  Children pre-rated for levels of aggression by their nursery teacher and female experimenters observed in playground, both well acquainted with children. Kids rated on 5 point scale/20 for their physical, verbal aggression, agg towards inanimate objects and aggression inhibition. Children assigned into triplets (matched agg levels) and assigned at random to 1 of 3 conditions (ag r.m, non-ag r.m, control with no role model). Inter rater reliability was high (89)
• Procedure (rooms 1)


  1. control group didn’t enter (didn’t see r.m), other children led into room with toys e.g. soldiers, Bono doll. After 1 min ag r.m performed standardised ag beh towards bobo doll e.g. ’sock him in the nose’, hit him with hammer. Routine repeated 3 times. Non-ag ignored Bobo, played with child for 10 mins.
• Procedure (room 2)


  2. all kids went into room filled with attractive toys like fire engine. experimenter said toys were for them to play with, but after 2 mins of playing toys taken away and told them they were reserved for other children (matched for anger levels)
• Procedure (room 3)


  3. contained various toys, children played for 20+ mins. Observed without knowledge through one way mirror in 5 second intervals (double blind). Female experimenter stayed in room but pretended to do paperwork to prevent distraction.
• Conclusions 


  Beh can be learnt via observation of models and can be transmitted from one sit to another. If a child sees adult behaving aggressively it legitimises beh so will assume it’s acceptable. Will imitate it even if r.m not present. Beh modelled by males more influential- gender socialisation impact modelling of beh.