Social Learning Theory

702 Words3 Pages
Social learning theory The social learning theory is based on observational learning. It states that behaviour is learned by watching others behave and observing the consequences from of the behaviour from an observed person. This contrast with behavioural approach with operant conditioning, which states that behaviour, is learned directly through punishment or reward. Another assumption is that all behaviour is learned from experience suggesting that it is on the nurture of the nurture/nature debate. Social learning theory also assumes that all mental processes are important in how people learn behaviour for example when an individual is observing and seeing the consequences of a behaviour, the observer will not repeat this behaviour if its punished for as a reward. This is what social learning theory psychologists call vicarious learning. This relates to the assumption that observational learning takes place as a result of people whom a person identifies as a role model. This is because a person might learn behaviour by observing a person receive an award and choose to not carry out that behaviour if he person carrying it out is not a role model. This assumption is further researched by the Bandura bobo doll experiment which studies if aggression behaviour is imitated by seeing a model being rewarded for being aggressive. Bandura found out that the children who had had observed an adult behaving aggressively behaved much more aggressively themselves than those who had observed non obsessive behaviour. They also found out that boys behaved more aggressively than girls and behaviour is most likely to be learned from a same sex model. The strengths of this experiment is that they used children because they are easier to influence so therefore it is easy for them t imitate behaviour. The limitations of this experiment is that the children did not know the models
Open Document