bandura

• background

  • social learning theory
  • vicarious reinforcement - when an individual observers another being praised for their behaviour and so replicates
  • meditational processes - attention, retention, motor reproduction, motivation
• aim - do children imitate aggressive behaviour when the model was absent
• hypotheses

  1. subjects exposed to aggressive models will reproduce the aggressive acts shown
  2. the observation of non-aggressive models will inhibit the children's behaviour and they would display less aggression than the control group
  3. boys will show more aggression than girls
  4. subjects will imitate the behaviour of a same-sex model to a greater degree
• method

  • controlled lab experiment
  • iv - type of model
  • dv - behaviour of the children
• sample

  • 36 boys and 36 girls mean age of 52
• procedure

  1. tested pre-existing levels of aggression, then randomly allocated to one of three conditions, children matched on gender and aggressiveness, 24 children in each condition
  2. stage 1 - 10 mins, the model displayed the behaviour
  3. stage 2 - children subjected to mild aggression arousal for 2 mins
  4. stage 3 - left alone for 20 mins with a variety of toys, including the toys the models played with e.g., bobo doll and tinker toy set
• results

  • boys showed more instances of aggression than girls, 25 male model aggressive boys, girls 7 instances of aggression with male model
• conclusions

  • Findings support social learning theory
  • children learning behaviour is more complicated than just consequences reward and punishment as there were no consequences in this study
  • appropriateness of the model - people will only imitate behaviour that is seen to be appropriate e.g, being aggressive is appropriate in a male
  • similarity of the model - boys were more likely to imitate the male model due to the similarity of themselves and the model
• strengths

  • quantitative and qualitative data gathered
  • standardised procedure
  • cause and effect can be established
• weaknesses

  • low ecological validity
  • snapshot
  • mundane realism low
  • the aggressiveness is shown on a toy bobo doll which may be the children enjoying themselves