Developmental Approach - Bandura et al 1961- Transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive models

The Behaviourist Perspective

All behaviour is learned and shaped by the environment

Operant Conditioning

Social Learning Theory (SLT)

Classical conditioning

Skinner

Observe and copy behaviour

Imitation

Vicarious Reinforcement

Observational learning

automatically learn behaviour by being exposed without need for reinforcement

involves copying whole units of behaviour

seeing another person being reinforced then likely to produce the same behaviour yourself

Core Study

72 children between 3y1m and 5y9m

pretested - physical aggression, verbal aggression, aggression to wards inanimate objects, aggression inhibition

independent variables - behaviour, sex of child, sex of model

Non-aggressive Condition = 24

Aggressive Condition = 24

6 girls + female model

6 boys + female model

6 boys + male model

6 girls + male model

6 boys + female model

6 girls + female model

6 Boys + male model

6 girsl + male model

Control Group = 24

6 girls + male model

6 girls + female model

6 boys + femal model

6 boys + male model

matched into 3s - one into each group

called Matched Pairs

Procedure

Played with stickers with 1 adult Room 1 -

'Model' sits at other table

adult leaves room

Agressive Model

Non-aggressive Model

played with all the toys not the BoBo doll toy

aggressive behaviour towards BoBo doll toy #

Room 2 - New exciting toys Play for 10 minutes

Told toys now for other children only not them

Room 3 - BoBo toy and other toys - Observed for 20 minutes

Control - no model #

Response measures when observing

Imitative verbal aggression - 'pow' 'sock him in the nose'

Imitative non-aggression - talking about doll

Imitation of physical aggression - punching doll

Partially imitative responses

Hitting other toys but not BoBo doll

sitting on BoBo doll but not aggressively

Non imitiative aggressive responses

Non-imitative physical agression

Non-imitative verbal agression

Aggressive gun play

Controls - children macthed on pre-existing agressio, same toys for each child, models did standard behaviour each time

Results

  1. children in aggressive model made more aggressive responses than in non-aggressive or control condition
  1. Girls in aggressive condition showed more physical aggression if the model was male. and more verbal aggression if model female
  1. boys more physically aggressive than girls but same in verbal aggression
  1. Boys more likley ti imitate same sex model than girls

Conclusions

Findings support Bandura's Social Learning Theory

Children learn social behaviour such as aggression through the process of observation learning

Children more likely to learn from same sex models

Boys are more physically aggressive than girls and more likely to engage in imitating physical aggression, although girls are seen to be verbally aggressive. Possibly due to socialisation