learning part 6 Flashcards
(9 cards)
Social Perspectives on Learning
Social perspectives on learning focus on how learning is shaped not just by external stimuli but also by internal psychological states and social interactions.
✳️ Highlighted point:
Unobservable, intervening constructs (e.g. beliefs, feelings, motives) affect learning.
✅ Analogy:
Think of learning like making soup. You see the ingredients going in (external input like a teacher or environment), and you taste the result (observable behavior). But in between, the soup is simmering. That simmering part — which includes things you can’t see directly, like motivation, emotions, or beliefs — is what psychologists call intervening constructs. You can’t see them, but they completely change the final taste.
It is not as simple as cause and effect.
That means learning is not just “teacher says something → student learns it.” The soup analogy again: you can’t just throw carrots in and assume the soup tastes like carrots — it depends on everything else inside.
Social Learning Theory: Is human social behaviour innate or learnt?
This asks: Are we born knowing how to act socially, or do we learn that from others?
✅ Answer (from the next slide):
Social Learning Theory (Bandura, 1977; Bandura & Walters, 1963): human social behaviour is not innate but learnt.
Like language, we learn social behavior by watching others, not by being born knowing it. We aren’t born knowing how to shake hands, say “thank you,” or argue on social media — we watch and learn it.
It has been mainly applied to explain how children learn aggressive behaviours.
If antisocial behaviour can be learnt, so can prosocial behaviour.
✅ Analogy:
Imagine a child who sees their sibling yelling when frustrated and getting their way. That child may copy the yelling when they want something — this is learning through observation.
But the same goes the other way — if a child sees kindness being rewarded (e.g. getting praise for sharing), they learn prosocial (positive) behaviors too.
Bandura: Experience and Learning
Although Bandura admitted the role of biological factors in aggression, the theory’s emphasis is on the role of experience.
This means genes and biology might make someone more likely to be aggressive, but experience — especially what we see around us — shapes whether and how that aggression happens.
🔵 Direct vs Vicarious Experience
These experiences can be direct or vicarious:
✅ Direct experience:
Aggressive behaviour is learned because the subject’s behaviour is reinforced (direct).
You do something, get rewarded, and learn to do it again. This is like Skinner’s operant conditioning.
✅ Analogy: If a kid grabs a cookie off the counter, and no one stops him, he learns that grabbing cookies works. If he gets scolded, he learns not to do it.
Example: “If a kid takes another kid’s biscuit from him, and no one mediates, then his behaviour is reinforced by having the biscuit.”
✅ Vicarious experience:
…because the subject observes someone else’s behaviour is reinforced (vicarious).
You see someone else do something and get a reward, and then you copy it.
✅ Analogy: If your big brother makes a joke at dinner and everyone laughs, you might try to tell a joke next time — not because you were rewarded, but because he was.
Learning occurs through the processes of modelling and imitation of other people.
Modelling and Imitation
Key idea:
Simply observing a model perform a behaviour can produce an imitation of behaviour in children.
✅ Analogy:
If a child watches someone kick a ball every day, they’re likely to imitate that without ever being directly taught — just like how toddlers pretend to talk on a phone after watching adults.
📊 Bobo Doll Experiment (Bandura, Ross & Ross, 1963)
Method:
4–5-year-old children watched an adult interact with a Bobo doll (a clown-shaped inflatable doll).
Different groups saw different versions:
Group 1: saw a real adult aggressively hitting/kicking Bobo live.
Group 2: saw the same behavior in a video.
Group 3: saw the same video but the adult was dressed as a cartoon character.
Control Group: saw no aggressive behavior.
Test: children were allowed to play with the Bobo doll afterwards.
🔵 Results
Children in groups 1, 2 and 3 behaved more aggressively than the control group.
The more real the aggression looked, the more likely the child was to imitate it:
Live model = most aggression
Video = still a lot
Cartoon = some
Control = least
Despite the live model producing the highest imitation, these results suggest watching TV (or videogames) may also produce social learning of aggressive behaviour.
✅ Analogy: Kids don’t just imitate real-life people. They learn from TV shows, YouTube, games, and more. Just like you might pick up fashion ideas from Instagram, kids pick up behavior from media.
🔹 What is vicarious reinforcement?
“How much children imitate a model’s behaviour also depends on whether the behaviour is reinforced or punished.”
✅ Definition: Vicarious reinforcement is when you observe someone else being rewarded or punished for their actions, and that observation influences your own behavior.
🧠 Analogy:
Imagine you’re in class, and a student answers a question. The teacher gives them chocolate. You didn’t get chocolate — but you now feel more motivated to answer next time. That’s vicarious reinforcement.
🔹 “The observer somehow experiences vicarious reinforcement.”
Even though you’re not the one being rewarded or punished, your brain still learns from what happens to others. It’s like your mind is playing out a mental simulation: “If I do that, I’ll get that too.”
📚 Bandura (1965) Study Breakdown
Children (ages 3–6) watched an adult act aggressively toward a Bobo doll. But now there’s a twist:
The children observed the model’s behaviour being reinforced in one of 3 ways:
🟡 1. Positive reinforcement:
The model was given sweets and drinks.
→ Like cheering someone on after they do something “cool” — this makes the behavior look attractive.
🔴 2. Punishment:
The model was verbally scolded.
→ Just like when someone gets yelled at for breaking something — makes you less likely to copy them.
⚪ 3. No consequence:
The model’s behaviour had no outcome (control group).
→ The kid sees the aggressive act, but there’s no feedback — like a blank response.
✅ Test:
Children were then allowed to play with the Bobo doll.
This is the moment of truth — does the observation change their behavior?
✅ Results:
No difference in aggressive behaviour between children in reinforcement and control groups.
So, just seeing someone get rewarded didn’t increase aggression that much more than no consequence at all.
BUT:
Much less aggressive behaviour in the punishment group compared to other groups.
So the punishment worked — seeing someone get in trouble made children less likely to imitate the aggression.
🧃 Analogy 1 — Juice Box on the Playground
You’re watching your friend push someone and then:
They get a juice box from another friend? → You think, “Hmm… maybe pushing is cool.”
They get yelled at by the teacher? → You think, “Yikes, I better not.”
Nothing happens? → You’re unsure; maybe you copy, maybe not.
That’s the essence of this experiment.
Vicarious Reinforcement Can Also Encourage Prosocial Behaviour
We often think of learning aggression through observation, but the same system can teach kindness.
Hornstein et al. (1970)
👛 Setup:
Adults watched a person return a lost wallet under different emotional reactions.
Group 1: The model appeared pleased to help. (Reinforcement)
Group 2: The model appeared annoyed to help. (Punishment)
Group 3: The model showed no emotion. (No consequence)
Then all participants encountered a real lost wallet.
✅ Results:
Group 1 (pleased model) was most likely to return the wallet.
Group 2 (annoyed model) was least likely.
🧠 Analogy:
Imagine watching your older sibling happily help a neighbor carry groceries. You’re more likely to help someone yourself — not because anyone told you to, but because you observed that helping can feel good.
If instead your sibling grumbles the whole time, you’re less likely to copy that behavior.
