Social-Psychological : Social Learning Theory

• Learning


  Children learn behaviours by reinforcement, so by aggressively snatching a toy they there there are benefits to that behaviour.
• Vicarious Reinforcement


  Children acquire specific aggressive behaviours through observing aggressive role models. They work out how the behaviour is performed, and observe the consequences.
• Self-efficacy


  = extent to which we believe our actions will achieve a desired goal.

  • A child's self-efficacy develops with each successful outcome of aggression
  • They are confident that because their aggression has been effective in the past, it will continue to be so in the future
  • They learn that aggression works and they are good at it
• Bandura et al


  young children watched an adult behave aggressively towards a bobo doll, then the children were allowed into the room and they themselves behaved aggressively to the bobo doll. Another group of children watched an adult behave non-aggressively with the doll, and the children behaved non-aggressively too.
• Eval : Strength


  There is real-world application that SLT can help reduce aggression by encouraging children to form friendships, providing non-aggressive role models for them to follow, and reward them for non-aggressive behaviour.
• Eval : Weakness


  SLT only explains proactive aggression, where children with high self-efficacy use aggression to achieve their goals. However, it doesn't explain reactive aggression which is more likely to be used spontaneously.
• Eval : Weakness


  SLT suffers from environmental reductionism because it underestimates the influence of biology. SLT doesn't explain how Coccaro et al found MZ to have higher concordance rates than DZ twins for aggression. Therefore SLT is an incomplete and reductionist explanation.