Modeling

Description of the Strategy

Modeling is said to occur when a child learns by observing others. A young boy “pretends” to smoke a cigarette like his father and get ready for work in the morning like his mother. Similarly, a teenager “swaggers” down the street like his or her favorite actor or actress. As noted early on by Albert Bandura, modeling is based on the principles of vicarious or observational learning. Research conducted within the broad framework of cognitive social learning theory, a theory pioneered by Bandura, shows that virtually all learning that results from direct experiences can also result from vicarious ones (i.e., as a function of observing the behavior of others and the consequences associated with that behavior). Children acquire new responses, both appropriate (e.g., dressing oneself, social skills, play a musical instrument) and inappropriate (e.g., hitting a sibling, being afraid of dogs), through observing others. In addition, Bandura described how previously acquired responses can be facilitated, inhibited, or disinhibited through vicarious learning or modeling procedures. For example, a girl who observes her older brother engage in fearful behaviors toward dogs may subsequently inhibit approach behavior toward dogs—something in the past that she seemed to do and enjoy. Likewise, a boy who is fearful of novel social situations and observes a close friend engage in nonfearful social interactions may disinhibit avoidant responses and subsequently engage in approach behavior to the previously feared situations. With fearful children, this disinhibiting effect is believed to play a particularly critical role. That is, as the child observes appropriate positive interaction with the feared stimuli without undue negative consequences, extinction of the fear is facilitated, thus making approach possible.

With modeling, it is important to distinguish between learning the response and subsequently performing the response. In the examples cited above, the child might learn the various responses vicariously but not actually exhibit them. For example, a girl might learn how to dress herself and brush her teeth by observing her parents each morning but, much to the dismay of her parents, not exhibit the dressing and care skills. The distinction between learning and performance has been demonstrated in many research studies. In one such study, preschool children observed a film in which a model exhibited verbal and physical aggression to a Bobo doll. For one group of children, the model was rewarded for aggressive behavior toward the doll, in a second group the model was punished for the same behavior, and for a third group the model received no consequences for the aggressive behavior. Although children in all three groups learned the aggressive response, children who observed the model being punished inhibited the response, whereas those who saw the model reinforced actively displayed the aggressive response. Of most interest here, those children in the group who saw the model neither punished nor reinforced learned the response, even though they initially failed to display aggressive behavior. However, they clearly had acquired the actual behaviors depicted in the film as evidenced when they were subsequently reinforced for display of those behaviors. They simply failed to display them until reinforced for doing so. Thus, consequences to the model during the vicarious learning and subsequently administered to the child determine whether the response is actually displayed. Such findings are the cornerstone for societal concerns about violence and other “inappropriate” behaviors depicted in films more broadly. Learning occurs but might not find its expression until a later point in time.

...