Social Learning Theory (A02)

Social Learning Theory (A02)

1. IDAS

   • VALIDITY
     • Children in Banduras study may have displayed demand characteristics as they knew what was expected of them
     • Noble reports one child arriving at the lab for the experiemtn saying "look mummy there's the doll we have to hit"
     • Lack of mundane realism as use a doll not real person (who would hit back)
       • In resposne to this Bandura did a film of woman beating up a live clown and children went into room with him and kicked him hit him punched him etc
   • CULTURAL DIFFERENCES
     • SLT can explain cultural differences in aggression.
     • Among the Kung San of the Kalahari Desert aggression is comparatively rare.
       • CHILD REARING PROCESSES IS WHY
         • When two children argue or fight in Kung San the parents never reward nor punish them but they physically separate them and distract their attention.
         • In Kung San parents do not use physical punishment and aggressive postures are avoided by adults and devalued by the whole society.
         • The absence of direct reinforcement of aggressive behaviour and absence of aggressive models means their is little oppourtunity or motivation for the children to behave aggressively
   • ETHICAL ISSUES
     • This makes it difficult to test SLT experimentally.
     • Exposure of children to aggression knowing they may repeat it raises ethical issues: protection from physical and psychological harm

2. Support

   • Role of punishment
     • Did punishment prevent learning of the aggressive behaviour in group 2 of Banduras study or did it prevent performance of the behaviour?
       • Bandura testes ths by repeating the study but after exposure to the model all children performing aggressive behaviour of the model were given rewards
         • All 3 groups performed similar number of imitated acts suggesting production of behaviour is related to reinforcements, learning takes palce regardless of reinforcement
   • Applicability to adults
     • Phillips found daily homicide rates in the US almost always increased in the week following a major boxing match suggesting viewers were imitating behaviour thus SLT is evident in adults and children

3. Strengths

   • The role of vicarious learning
     • major strength of SLT is that it can explain aggressive behaviour in absence of direct reinforcement (operant conditoning cant). Children were not at any point directly rewarded for any action thus vicarious learning explains this
   • Inidividual differences in aggressive behaviour
     • SLT explains differences in aggressive and non aggressive behaviour between and within individuals
     • The culture of violence theory (wolfgang and ferracuti) proposes that in large societies some subcultures devleop norms that sanction violence to a greater degree than the dominant culture.
       • Some cultures may emphasise non aggressive behaviour proucing individuals that show low levels of aggression.
         • Differences within indicuals can be related to selctive reinforcement and context-dependent learning.- People repsond differently in different sitation as they have observed aggression as rewarded in some situations but not in others