Albert Bandura

• Bobo Doll experiment (1963)

  Experiment to measure aggression in children.

  Discovered that children who were exposed to aggressive adult behaviours copied/mimicked their aggressive behaviour. Non-aggressive behaviour played nicely. > Highlights social behaviour through imitation.
• Modelled aggression

  If a child sees their parents behaving aggressively, they are likely to imitate that modelled behaviour > People are likely to replicate criminal behaviour.
• Supporting study - Sutherland (1992)

  He considered that one explanation for criminal behaviour comes from differential associations (interactions with others).

  This could explain prisons being labelled as ‘Universities of Crime’ as the prisoners feed each other ideas, learn techniques and look up to others around them.
• Advantages of Social Learning Theory

  1. highlighted that the model did have an effect on the child’s behaviour. > Cause and effect present - When the an event is the cause of another event.
  2. The experiment had great controls including gender & actions of the model, allowing great accuracy.
  3. The study has been replicated with slight changes and yielding the same results.
• Disadvantages of Social Learning Theory

  1. Was criticised for not being true to real-life. > Experimental setting.
  2. It has ethical issues, exposing children to aggression with the understanding they’d imitate it is seen as wrong.
  3. Can aggressiveness really be measured?