session 4 - social learning

8/12/2019 Session 4 - Social Learning

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Social LearningDr. Pham Vu Phi Ho

Olson, M. H., & Hergenhahn, B. R. (2009).An Introduction to Theoriesof Learning (8th ed.). New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.

Jordan, A., Carlile, O. & Stack, A. (2008).Approaches to Learning AGuide For Teachers, pp. 227 - 242.Berkshire: McGraw-Hill.

asiaeuniversity


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Discussion

1. At what age/month should the child or your child be sent to theKindergarten?

2. What are the benefits or disadvantages that the child might have?

3. Do you have any experience of learning by observation? Describe it!

4. Do you agree with Durkheims, society is more important than theindividual (Alpert 1959).

5. Schools or home-schools, which is more important or more affected thechilds life?

6. I was just consulted by a grad student/ teacher of English (Dip 12A) thatshe does not want to send her son abroad (either the USA or Australia)

because she was afraid that her son will become indifferent to social issuesand broke familys value. To her opinion, what benefits the highcertificates or degrees bring to her son if he loses his value in life (in terms

of Asia culture). What do you think about this issue?


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Sociological theories

Society regulates all social life through its

institutions and systems. The totality of beliefsand sentiments of societys members forms thebasis of the moral and legal codes thatintegrate society and the individual.

This is of great importance to educationbecause it suggests that the business ofeducation is to mould children in accordance

with the norms and needs of society.


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Three elements in Durkheims model of

any society

System

the totality of organizations and groups insociety

Structure

the links between these organizations andgroups

Function

the role of these social bodies in realizingthe values and expectations of the society

Sociological

theories


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Social institutions and groups

Learning occurs within social

spheres and contexts, whichinform, develop, deepen andinfluence individual identity,

thinking, learning and meaning-making processes.


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Peer groups

In peer groups, individuals learn to interact, behave andconform in socially acceptable ways. They acquiresocial roles, responsibilities and identities, which aredeveloped through relationships and group

participation.

Group members develop strong emotional ties thatunite them in meaningful and affective ways and learnemotional control.

Individuals who do not belong to, or participatemeaningfully in social groups, run a greater risk ofdeveloping mental and emotional problems (Goffman1961; Laing and Easterson 1970).

Cont.


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Friendship and peer groups

The influence of peers becomes more important thanthat of the family group as children move into their

teenage years. Although parental influence is still important in career

and money matters, the peer group is more importantin establishing social status and identity (Sebald

1986).

At this stage of development, belonging to the peergroup may be more important than adoptingeducational values (Hargreaves 1967).

Cont.


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Psychological theories

The social groups to which we belong haveprofound effects on how we act and on how

we perceive ourselves. For example, it may be enough to be placed

in a team or simply labelled as a group. The

members of the group consider themselves tobe the in group and other groups to be theout groups. In the in group, similarities areenhanced, as are the differences from the out

groups.

Social

identity


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Psychological theories

Social cognitivists believe that people learn a

new behaviour simply by watching whatother people do.

For examples, students are better reader whentheir parents read often at home and children

become more aggressive when they observeaggressivemodels on television. The watchingprocess is popularly known as modeling.

Social

identity


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Social Learning Theory

Social learning theory extends behaviourism.

Both behaviourism and social learning theoryagree that experience is an important cause oflearning. They also include the concepts ofreinforcement and punishment in their

explanation of behaviour. Furthermore, theyagree that feedback is important in promotinglearning (Eggen and Kaucak, 2007).


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Albert Banduras social learning theory


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Observational Learning

Most of the principles of the social

learning theory were developed byBandura (Papalia, Olds & Feldman,2007). Social learning theory believes

that students learn by observing orwatching and imitating other people.This process is called modelling orobservational learning.


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One of the most important examples is the effect

of watching violent media has on aggressive

behaviour as shown in Figure 4.5.

Cont.


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EARLIER EXPLANATIONS OF

OBSERVATIONAL LEARNINGThorndike's and Watson's Explanations ofObservational Learning

Both Thorndike and Watson concluded thatlearning can result only fromdirect experienceand not from indirect orvicarious experience.

In other words, they said that learning occurredas a result of one's personal interactions withthe environment and not as a result ofobserving another's interactions.


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Miller and Dollard did not deny that anorganism could learn by observing theactivities of another organism.

Ifimitative behavioris reinforced, it willbe strengthened like any other kind ofbehavior. Thus, imitative learning issimply a special case of instrumentalconditioning.


OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING

Cont.


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Miller and Dollard (1941) divided imitative behaviorinto three categories:

Same behavioroccurs when two or more individualsrespond to the same situation in the same way.

Copyingbehavior involves the guiding of oneperson's behavior by another person.

Inmatched-dependentbehavior, an observer isreinforced for blindly repeating the actions of a model.Perhaps this is the rationale behind the old saying,"When in Rome, do as the Romans do."



Cont.


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BANDURA'S EXPLANATION OF


According to Bandura, observational learning may or maynot involve imitation.

Ex: while driving down the street you may see a car hit apothole, and based on this observation, you may swerve tomiss the hole and avoid damage to your car.

In this case, you learned from your observation, but you didnot imitate what you had observed.

What you learned wasinformation,which was processedcognitively and acted on in a way that was advantageous.

Observational learning, therefore, is much more complexthan simple imitation, which usually involves mimicking

another person's actions.

Cont.


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Banduras (1965) experiment: children observed a filmin which amodel was shown hitting and kicking a

large doll. In this case, a film showed an adult model-ing aggressiveness.

One group of children saw the model reinforced forhis aggressiveness; a second group of children saw the

model punished for his aggressiveness. For a thirdgroup, the consequences of the model's aggressivenesswere neutral; that is, the model was neither reinforcednor punished.

Empirical Observations


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Later, children in all three groups were exposed to thedoll, and their aggressiveness toward it was measured.

As might be expected, the children who saw the modelreinforced for aggressiveness were most aggressive;

the children who saw the model punished foraggressiveness were least aggressive;

and the children who saw the model experienceneutral consequences were between the two othergroups in their aggressiveness.

Empirical Observations Cont.


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This much of the study is interesting because it demonstrates thatthe children's behavior was influenced by indirect or vicariousexperience. In other words, what they observed another person

experiencing had an impact on their own behavior. The children in the first group observedvicarious reinforcement,

and it facilitated their aggressiveness;

children in the second group observed vicarious punishment,and

it inhibited their aggressiveness. Although the children did notexperience reinforcement or punishment directly, it modified theirbehavior just the same.

This result is contrary to Miller and Dollard's contention thatobservational learning will occur only if the organism'sovert

behavior is followed by reinforcement.

Empirical Observations Cont.


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Learning from a model


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Reciprocal determination model

Environmentalfactors

Resources,

other people,

consequences ofaction

Personal factors

Belief, attitudes,

strategic thinking, andintelligence

Behaviour

Individualsaction,

and verbalstatement

Bandura

developed a

reciprocaldetermination

model that

comprises 3

factors

Albert

Banduras

Theory


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Behaviour, environment and person factorsinteract to influence learning. They influence

and are influenced by each other. For example, a teachers feedback

(environment) can lead students to set highergoals (person/cognitive) and these goals willmotivate students to put more efforts(behaviour) in their studies.

Reciprocal determination model Cont.


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Reciprocal Determinism

Why do people act as they do?

The person, the environment, and the person's behavior itself allinteract to produce the person's subsequent behavior. In otherwords, none of the three components can be understood inisolation from the others as a determiner of human behavior.

Behavior influences the person and the environment as it is tosay that the environment or the person influences behavior.

Reinforcements, like punishments, exist only potentially in theenvironment and are actualized only by certain behavior

patterns.

Therefore, which aspects of an environment influence us are

determined by how we act on the environment.


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According to Bandura, people can influence the environment byacting in certain ways, and the changed environment will, in turn,influence their subsequent behavior.

But Bandura points out that even though there is an interaction amongpeople, the environment, and behavior, any of these components maybe more influential than the others at any given time.

e.g. Ones beliefs may be the most influential determiner on ones

action. To summarize, Bandura's concept of reciprocal determinism states that

behavior, the environment, and people (and their beliefs) all interactand that this three-way interaction must be understood before we canunderstand human psychological functioning and behavior.

Reciprocal Determinism Cont.


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Bandura (1986) lists four processes that influence observationallearning.

Attentional Processes Before something can be learned from a model, the model must be

attended to. As was noted, Bandura thought learning is an ongoingprocess, but he points out that only what is observed can be learned.

An observer's selective attention can be influenced by past

reinforcements.

Models will be attended to more often if they are similar to the observer(i.e., same sex, age, etc.), are respected, have high status, havedemonstrated high competence, are thought of as powerful, and areattractive.

MAJOR THEORETICAL CONCEPTS


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Retentional processes

For information gained from observation to be useful, it

must be retained. There areretentional processesin which information is

stored symbolically in two ways, internally and Verbally.

The imaginally stored symbols are actual stored pictures of

the modeled experience, which can be retrieved and actedon long after the observational learning has taken place.

Most of the cognitive processes that regulate behavior areprimarily conceptual rather than imaginal.

MAJOR THEORETICAL CONCEPTS Cont.


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Behavioral production processesdetermine the extent to which what has been

learned is translated into performance. Any observed discrepancies between one's ownbehavior and the memory of the model's

behavior trigger corrective action. This processcontinues until there is an acceptable matchbetween the observer's behavior and themodel's behavior.



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For Bandura, however, learners gain information byobserving either the consequences of their own behavior orof the behavior of others. The information gained by these

observations can then be utilized in a variety of situationswhen a need to use it arises.

To summarize, we can say that observational learninginvolves attention, retention, behavioral abilities, and

incentives. Therefore, if observational learning fails to occur, it could be

that the observer did not observe the relevant activities of themodel, did not retain them, was physically incapable ofperforming them, or did not have the proper incentive toperform them.



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Bandura (1977, p. 107) believes that the intrinsicreinforcement that comes from self-evaluation is much

more influential than the extrinsic reinforcement dis-pensed by others.

Persons with high perceived self-efficacy try more,accomplish more, and persist longer at a task than those

with low perceived self-efficacy. The former also tendto experience less fear and less shame than the latter(Covert, Tangney, Maddux, & Heleno, 2003).

Self-Regulation of Behavior


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One'sperceivedself-efficacy may or may notcorrespond to one'sreal self-efficacy.

The situation is best when one's aspirations are in linewith one's capabilities.

People who continually attempt to do things beyondtheir capabilities experience frustration and despair and

may eventually give up on almost everything. On theother hand, if people with high self-efficacy do notadequately challenge themselves, their personal growthmay be inhibited.

Self-Regulation of Behavior Cont.


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Because one's behavior is at least partially determined by one'scognitive processes, it follows that if these processes do not accuratelyreflect reality, maladaptive behavior can result.

Bandura gives several reasons for the development of faulty, cognitiveprocesses.

First, children may develop false beliefs because they tend to evaluatethings on the basis of appearance;

Second, errors in thought can occur when information is derived frominsufficient evidence.

Third, fallacies in thinking can arise from faulty informationprocessing. For example, someone who believes that all farmers lackintelligence would necessarily conclude that any particular farmer lacks

intelligence. This deduction is false because the premise (belief) isfalse.

FAULTY COGNITIVE PROCESSES


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Bandura believes that anything that can be learned bydirect experience can also be learned from observation.

Bandura also believes that models are most effective ifthey are seen as having respect, competence, high status,or power. In most cases, teachers can be highlyinfluential models.

Through careful planning of what is presented, teacherscan do more than leach routine information. They canmodel skills, problem- solving strategies, moral codes,

performance standards, general rules and principles, andcreativity.

Bandura on Education


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Reaching a personal goal is also reinforcing, and teachers shouldhelp students formulate goals that are neither too easy nor toodifficult to achieve.

According to Bandura, retention is largely determined by one'sverbal ability. A teacher must, therefore, take the verbal ability ofthe students into consideration when planning a modelingexperience.

The teacher must be aware of motivational processes. At this point,extrinsic reinforcement may be useful. For example, students maybe willing to demonstrate what they have learned if they are offeredpoints, stars, grades, or the admiration of the teacher.

Extrinsic reinforcement is being used to influence performance

rather than learning.

Bandura on Education Cont.


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1. What conclusions did Thorndike and Watson reach about observationallearning, and why did they reach them?

2. Describe Miller and Dollards research on observational learning and

their explanation for what they found.3. Briefly describe attentional, retentional, behavioral production, and

motivational processes, and describe their influence on behaviorallearning.

4. According to Bandura, why is verbal more important than imagination?

5. How does Bandura answer the question why do people act as they do?

6. According to Bandura, do people influence the environment or theenvironment influence people? Which component is the most influentialdeterminer of a persons actions?

Guiding Questions


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7. Describe several ways in which faulty cognitive processes candevelop. Give examples of the kinds of behavior that faultycognitive processes can generate.

8. Explain why someone who accepts Banduras theory would be veryconcerned about the content of childrens TV programs.

9. Why do children imitate some behaviors that they observe and notothers?

10. For Bandura, as for the Gestalt theorists and Tolman, intrinsicreinforcement is far more important than extrinsic reinforcement.Do you agree with Bandura that extrinsic reinforcement canactually reduce a student's motivation to learn?

11. In order to imply effectively observational learning in the

l di t B d h t t th t h t k i t

Guiding Questions Cont.

session 4 - social learning

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