Observational Learning

Observational learning is learning by acquiring skills by observing others actions. (Learning you do either intentionally or unintentionally by watching and/or being near others actions). You can just observe a certain skill someone is showing and unintentionally find yourself doing that skill. There are most definitely pro’s and con’s of observational learning. For example (from personal experience) I unintentionally used observational learning while I was training for work. I work at Dick’s Sporting Goods and while training for apparel, they kind of just threw me in and expected me to know everything within a few days of me working there. Luckily, I had observed how other co-workers did thing around the store and started picking up on things a lot faster! A negative effect of observational learning would be violent video games. Let's say a 10 year old boy is playing a fighting game. One day when his mom tells him no, the 10 year old boy might be likely to hit his mother as his characters fight in his video games.

In the 1960’s, Albert Bandura conducted a research called “The Bobo Doll Study” in hopes of finding out if children views aggressive behavior, would they act out aggressively? There were a total of 3 stages, and 72 total children took part into this experiment but were subdivided into 24 kids in a group. 12 boys and 12 girls watched a model (either male or female) act aggressively towards the bobo doll, or acted non-aggressively, and even 24 participants who weren't exposed to any model (Stage 1). Each child was taken into the room with lots of toys, and potentially mimicked what they were exposed to. Either the child would kick, and punch the bobo doll, play with it nicely, or even bypass it. Depending on what model they were exposed to (stage 2). After that, the child would be left in the room alone for 20 minutes, surrounded by aggressive (Such as mallets, hammers,darts etc) and nonaggressive toys (uch as stuffed animals, tea sets, crayons). Every...