Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory

According to Bandura's Social Cognitive Theory, a person is neither good nor bad, but influenced by three factors which are Cognitive (personal factors), Behaviors and Environmental factors. This theory also assumes four cognitive factors that influence personality. They are the Language ability, Purposeful behavior, Observational learning and Self-analysis

To understand behavior Bandura defined self-efficacy as how much competent a person feels to do to carry out a task, with the self-esteem been the sense of self worth. For instance a person may skilled mechanic may feel high self-efficacy to do his job and yet have a low self-esteem of himself.

Social-cognitive theory describes low self-esteem by how one measures to their own self representation. A person that does not meet his/her own ideal self, may develop ole self -esteem therefore causing that person to have negative feelings about his/her self.

According to Bandura's social-cognitive theory, a person can transform their self-esteem through imitating their role models. Which means that a person who has low self-esteem can alter this personality by observing individuals with high self-esteem as role models. As a result this is then incorporated in the learning theories such that the role model plays a vital role in enhancing changes in that person's self-esteem.

The theory suggests that role models play a key role in helping others raise their self-esteem by ensuring that they are in the right company.

On the other hand, person that is always in the around people who have low esteem is less likely to develop high self-esteem. Self-esteem is also enhanced by developing a high degree of self-efficacy as a result of having been with the right people, with high self esteem.

Consequently, by presenting suitable learning environments for individuals with low self-esteem, the situation is bound to change as the leaner will be striving to pick up traits that will enable him/her to boost his/her...