Behaviors that can be learned through modeling:

Many behaviors can be learned, at least partly, through modeling. Examples that can be cited are, students can watch parents read, students can watch the demonstrations of mathematics problems, or seen someone acting bravely and a fearful situation. Aggression can be learned through models. Much research indicate that children become more aggressive when they observed aggressive or violent models. Moral thinking and moral behavior are influenced by observation and modeling. This includes moral judgments regarding right and wrong which can in part, develop through modeling.

Conditions necessary for effective modeling to occur:

Bandura mentions four conditions that are necessary before an individual can successfully model the behavior of someone else:

1. Attention: the person must first pay attention to the model.

2. Retention: the observer must be able to remember the behavior that has been observed. One way of increasing this is using the technique of rehearsal.

3. Motor reproduction: the third condition is the ability to replicate the behavior that the model has just demonstrated. This means that the observer has to be able to replicate the action, which could be a problem with a learner who is not ready developmentally to replicate the action. For example, little children have difficulty doing complex physical motion.

4. Motivation: the final necessary ingredient for modeling to occur is motivation, learners must want to demonstrate what they have learned. Remember that since these four conditions vary among individuals, different people will reproduce the same behavior differently.

Effects of modeling on behavior:

Modeling teaches new behaviors.

Modeling influences the frequency of previously learned behaviors.

Modeling may encourage previously forbidden behaviors.

Modeling increases the frequency of similar behaviors. For example a student might see a friend excel in basketball and he tries to excel in football because he is not tall enough for basketball.

Self efficacy:

People are more likely to engage in certain behaviors when they believe they are capable of executing those behaviors successfully. This means that they will have high self-efficacy. In layman's terms self-efficacy could be looked as self confidence towards learning.

How self-efficacy affects behavior:

Joy of activities: individuals typically choose activities they feel they will be successful in doing.

Effort and persistence: individuals will tend to put more effort end activities and behaviors they consider to be successful in achieving.

Learning and achievement: students with high self-efficacy tend to be better students and achieve more.

Factors in the development of self efficacy:

In general students typically have a good sense of what they can and cannot do, therefore they have fairly accurate opinions about their own self-efficacy. In my multimedia program, the challenge is to increase student self-efficacy. There are many factors which affect self efficacy. Some of these factors can be; previous successes and failures, messages received from others, and successes and failures of others. Note example of ACS and Cliff & Vanessa.

Self regulation:

Self-regulation has come to be more emphasized in social learning theory. Self-regulation is when the individual has his own ideas about what is appropriate or inappropriate behavior and chooses actions accordingly. There are several aspects of self regulation:

Setting standards and goals

Self observation

Self judge

Self reaction

Promoting self-regulation can be an important technique. This is usually done by teaching the individual to reward himself after doing the needed behavior. For example, a graduate student will tell himself to complete a certain chapter before taking a break and relaxing.

Self instructions:

An effective strategy is to teach learners to give themselves instructions that guide their behavior. There are five steps to achieve this goal:

Cognitive modeling:

Overt external guidance

Overt self guidance

Faded, overt self guidance

covert self instruction

Self monitoring and self reinforcement:

These are two ways that people can control their own behavior. First they monitor and observe their own behavior, sometimes even scoring behavior. Secondly, people are also able to change their behavior by reinforcing themselves, by giving are withholding reinforcement.