The Bandura Study
A) The Bandura study aimed to see if children copying aggression that they see in adults. In the study a male or female model was aggressive toward a bobo doll, the children were then observed to see if they imitated any behaviour shown by the model, or if they were/weren’t aggressive. There were also 2 control groups, one of which had seen a non aggressive male/female model and another group was observed after seeing no model.
The results showed that the children were more aggressive when they had seen the aggressive model. Boys were, on average, more aggressive than girls. The gender of the model also had an affect on the behaviour of the children. Boys were more
…show more content…
This may have made the child more aggressive than it would usually have been which would show that child as being more aggressive and so affecting the results. There was also a big cultural change in the years following Banduras’ study. When this study took place there were very stereotypical views of men and women, this means that the children may have been reluctant to copy the behaviour of the aggressive female model, but were more likely to copy the behaviour of the aggressive male model, because society at the time expected more aggression from men. Girls may also have been less aggressive at that time because it was what was expected from society and vice versa with the boys.
2. Another problem with snapshot studies as they really go against the point of developmental psychology. They don’t look at how children develop and change over time, a snapshot just looks at one aspect over a very short period of time. Generalisations are then made of all children and young people, from the results of a few children of a certain age. In the Bandura study he used children of a nursery age and observed them for only 20mins; the results are then seen has having big implications on television and computer games. The results could have been like they were because children of that age are impressionable or that they feel that they have to copy adults more than older children,
Albert Bandura’s results of the experiment sustained three of the four original predictions that were made. The first being that the children who were exposed to the aggressive model had the exact behavior they had observed when the adult was no longer in sight. Second, Bandura also foresaw that experimental children in the non-aggressive group would behave much less aggressive than those who were exposed to aggression. The results of the experiment indicated that while children of both genders in the non-aggressive group did exhibit less aggression than the control group, boys who had observed an opposite-sex model behave non-aggressively were more likely than those in the control group to engage in
They proved that the kids’ observations of adults being violent, sent the message to children that that type of violence is okay. Consequently, the likelihood that a kid would respond to frustration with aggressive behavior was raised considerably. These findings led to more studies about aggression. Some years later, the same team decided to test how live models compared to video models in their ability to influence kids (live won) and they also tested reinforcement on the kids being aggressive or passive (found that more violence when rewarded for it, and less when
By watching the video about Dr. Bandura’s Bobo doll experiment, it is clear that his hypothesis was that children who see aggressive behavior tend to be aggressive, while children who do not see aggressive behavior will probably not show an aggressive behavior (Research Methods Presentation). Bandura’s hypothesis was that “children can learn about aggressive behaviors by observing the action of others” (Durkin, 1995, pp. 405-406).
How much we do and feel are learned from other people. Albert Bandura researches further on how watching others influences our behavior. Bandura choice to study Aggression; watching violence reduces aggression. To figure out if it was true or not, Bandura experimented on young children ages 3-5 years old. This experiment was called the Bobo Doll Experiment; demonstrating how children learn through observation and imitation. The study showed that the young children imitated everything they had seen by the adult which they were kicking, hitting, and hammering it. In his study, what was most interesting is when the child imitated the adult of the same sex. Basically, the results of Bandura is based on what the children saw, is what they did.
There are various different factors that influence aggression in both children and adults. More so, significant research has proven that there are distinct differences between aggression shown by men and women. Aggression is behavior intended to harm another individual, and extreme cases on aggression is called violence. In 2010, 90% of murderers in the United States were male. Numerous researchers have found that the gender differences in aggression are astounding, and that males show aggression a significant amount more than females. These differences are primarily because of what we learn, and what we experience throughout the lifespan. It is true that both males and females learn aggression through learning and experience, but the way
Psychologist Albert Bandura (1961) conducted an experiment studying children’s behaviour through Social Learning Theory, observational learning or modelling; He did this using a ‘BoBo doll’. The children were taken into a room with either an adult male or adult female role model and shown the bobo doll. The role model would then show aggression to the doll by punching it or knocking it down. Then the children were allowed to play with the doll.
The process began when Bandura selected 36 boys and 36 girls to partake in the event by observing them in a nursery, and grouping them together based on whether they have similar levels of aggressiveness in everyday behaviour. For the first part of the experiment, the children were individually took into a playroom, where the adult present engaged with them in a non aggressive manner, for example by playing a game with them. the adult, the changed
Modeling, according to Bandura, was a form of observational learning. Observational learning is learning through watching. According to Bandura, social behavior is passed down from each generation, in all societies. Behavioral patterns are usually observed by the younger age group and help a child develop. If the role model of the younger child is aggressive, it is more than likely the child will grow up with aggressive tendencies. The concept of modeling being a predisposing risk factor for aggression can be seen through Bandura’s BOBO doll study. Bandura and his research team escorted 4-year-olds into a play area with toys. While the experimental group of kids was playing with the toys, an adult entered the room and started acting violent with the BOBO doll, knocking it down, kicking and punching it, and shouting vulgarities at the doll. Later on, when the children were playing alone with the BOBO doll, they started to have aggressive tendencies, yelling at the BOBO doll and punching and kicking it violently, mocking the actions modeled by the adult previously. This experiment clearly showed Bandura’s hypothesis of modeling being a prompting risk factor for aggression. The children who are very impressionable at a young age and therefore imitated the adult, believing that the aggressive action was the correct action. This shows that a model
Giumetti and Pattrick M. Markey, chose to write this article on the theory of violent video games being associated with aggression. They had quite a few references where they have gotten their information from. They used those references to help them emphasize their theories, beliefs, and facts of violent video games and aggression before doing the study on their participants. All the different types of researchers and their theories were an example of how their is diversity in the examples that they had. Each one of those researchers had developed some facts on how the video games that are violent will cause angry people, or people in general, to experience some sort of aggression. They have a unique form of how they interpret their research to the actual study, since everything is very different. The ethics of the study are greatly represented in the article. It is simple to understand that they had very excellent morals for doing this study. First, they gather participants that are in college or around that age. This is because they needed people who would understand the environment of video games, instead of having grown adults who would not be as affected to study. Everything that they did during the study was based on good morals and everything was effectively all done with the consent of the participants. The limitations that they might have had is knowing whether the person would show aggression or satisfaction after playing the violent video game. Since the violent games are supposed to show the aggression that that person should have after playing it, they could come out with a different approach to it. The confounds that were found were when the people showed the aggression that they had after they heard the stories that had happened to the main character in each story. Since those are not controlled by the researchers, the participants are allowed to have their own personal reactions towards what they heard. Both articles,
Some testing that Anderson used consisted of cross-sectional surveys. This allowed him to gather evidence displayed from the tests. He observed physical aggression, verbal aggression, and aggressive thoughts. Research methods were used to examine youngsters of different ages and from different cultures. The results of these tests were examined. The participants did not
Bandura et al. (1963) studies are perhaps the most significant studies not only of their time, but also of the present. Bandura studies lead to the theory of social learning. The theory of social learning helps to explain how certain human behaviors, especially aggression, are acquired. Children and teenagers usually learn to resolve conflicts in the way they see models do so. These models can be from the TV, cartoons, sports figures, and especially their parents or guardians. Past studies indicate that children learn aggression seen and consequently exhibit aggression on real life events, (Bandura et al., 1963; Lovaas, 1962; Mowrer, 1961). Nevertheless, more recent studies indicate that children and adolescents still display the same tendencies, (Aroson et al., 2007; Piotrowski, 2005).
A study conducted by Bandura, Ross and Ross (1961) explored if observation and imitation rather than genetic aspects can teach social behaviour in children such as aggression. This was known as the bobo doll experiment. The independent variables consisted of three conditions, aggression, non-aggression and no model shown. Therefore the children’s level of aggression being the dependent variable. Bandura, Ross and Ross (1961) wanted to identify if children can imitate through
A main concept needing to be revealed is why males and females display aggression in different ways. Many studies have examined aggression tendencies according to gender. Some studies discussed in this literature that surround gender related aggression examine males being more physically aggressive than females, women being more socially aggressive, with personality and emotional factors being linked to aggression. Hormones, parental involvement, environment, and gender role factors are also reflected. Studies discussed will be compared to further acknowledge gender differences with aggression.
Social influence contains the ability to change the way a person reacts to a situation. An individual can adapt to a situation based on their surroundings. This type of influence begins as early as childhood when the mind is most vulnerable to learning. To test the vulnerability of a child’s mind, an experiment was conducted by Bandura, who theorized the process of social learning. In the study, 36 boys and girls of ages three to six were observed after they viewed a video on a model aggressively attacking a Bobo doll. After the children observed the aggressive model, the children imitated similar actions. According to the results, “Children learn social behavior such as aggression through the process of observation learning—through watching
A study by Christopher Ferguson, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Chair of Psychology at Stetson University, was conducted with 165 teenagers. The results showed that there was no increased violence and some of the teens had a significant decrease in aggression. He tried this experiment again with a different set of teens to make sure the results were accurate. He wanted the teens to be different from each other to see if different groups of people responded to video games differently. So, this so he put girls to the test along with many different cultures and races. He had all of the play video games for and hour and the tests came back with the same results. There was no increase of aggression and some of the teens had decreased aggression after