Eval - SLT

• Cognitive factors

  • SLT recognises the importance of cognitive factors in learning
  • Humans and animals store information about the behaviour of others and use this to make judgements about when it is appropriate to perform certain actions
  • 'From observing others one forms an idea of how new behaviours are performed, and on later occasions this coded information serves as a guide to action' (Bandura 1977)
  • Suggests SLT provides a more comprehensive explanation of human learning by recognising the role of mediational processes
• Limitation - Biological influences on social learning were under-emphasised in SLT

  SLT has been criticised for making too little reference to the influence of biological factors on social learning

  • Although Bandura claimed natural biological differences influenced our learning potential, he thought that learning itself was determined by the environment
  • Recent research suggests that observational learning, of the kind Bandura was talking about, may be the result of mirror neurons in the brain, which allow us to empathise with and imitate other people