SBenegaL

Category: Social Learning Theory

  • Social Learning Theory

    In the last byte, we looked at extinction and understand how it could be used to drive a desired behavior. In today’s byte, we look at how people pick up things from others in their environment (this is part of the discussion we initiate today on social learning).

    The Social Learning Theory was proposed by Albert Bandura; the underlying belief is that learning occurs through the observation of other people and the modeling of their behavior. An individual could learn from their surroundings, by looking at their parents, relatives, supervisors etc.

    If we are to question, how this could be effective at all; we would quickly realize that it relies more on the confidence an individual has on his/her ability to perform a task. In this case, when the individual’s beliefs and expectancies about his or her ability to perform a specific task, also called task-specific self-efficacy is the central underlying idea.

    Self-efficacy has four sources:

    1. Prior Experience
    2. Behavior Models (witnessing the success of others)
    3. Persuasion from other people
    Assessment of Current physical and emotional capabilities

    Success is only possible when one believes in one’s own capability to get something done!

    Look at experiences around you or even within you to look out for examples of self efficacy… there definitely are many