The Bobo Doll Experiment

Albert Bandura was born on December 04, 1925 in Mundare, Alberta. He is the youngest and also the only son, of six. Bandura is Ukrainian and Polish decent. Albert’s parent was a huge influence on his education endeavors. The summer after finishing high school, he worked in the Yukon to protect the Alaska Highway against sinking. He was later credited his work in the tundra as the origin of his interest in human psychopathology. This experience in the Yukon, he was exposed to a subculture of gambling and drinking, which helped broaden his perspective and scope of views on life. Bandura came to the United States in 1949 and became a citizen in 1956. In 1952, he married his beloved wife, Virginia Varns. He has two daughters, Carol and Mary.

As a student with free time, Albert took a psychology class and became intrigued with the course. In 1949, he graduated within 3 years with a B.A. from The University of British Columbia. He later moved to the then-epicenter of theoretical psychology, the University of Iowa, where he received his M.A in 1951 and PH.D in 1952. During his time at Iowa University, Albert came to support a style of psychology which probed psychological phenomena through repeatable, experimental testing.
Upon graduation, he participated in an internship with Wichita Kansas Guidance Center. The following year, he became a teacher at Sanford University in 1953 and is still there today. In 1974, he was elected as the president of the American Psychological Association, which is the largest association of psychologist. He actually ran for the election to just run and was surprised when he won. He directed his research to the role of social modeling in human motivation, action and thought. While working with Richard Walter, his first doctoral student, he engaged in studies of social learning and aggression. Their efforts were a critical role of modeling in the human behavior and it led to a research program into the mechanisms of observational learning.
The original phase of Bandura’s research and analyzed the base of human learning and the readiness of adults and children to imitate behavior observed in others, focusing on aggression. He found that according to Social Learning Theory , models are an important source for learning mew behaviors and for achieving behavioral change in institutionalized settings.” The theory assumes that there are three regulatory systems that control behavior. First, the antecedent inducements greatly influence the time and response of behavior.
The Stimulus that occurs before the behavioral response must be appropriate in relationship to social context and performers. Second, response feedback influences also serve an important function. Following a response, the reinforcements, by experience or observation, will greatly impact the occurrence of the behavior in the future. Third, the importance of cognitive functions in social learning.”
While researching with Walters, he began his first publication.

The book was called “Adolescent Aggression” , in 1959 and it led to the publication of his second book “Aggression: A Social Learning Analysis”, in 1973. This time period was ruled by the study of behavior. He believed the sole behavioral modifiers of reward and punishment in classical and operant conditioning were inadequate as a framework. Bandura began to study the means of treating aggressive children by identifying the sources of their violent ways. In 1961 Albert Bandura operated a controversial experiment known as The Bobo Doll Experiment, designed to show that similar behavior were learned by individuals shaping their own behavior after the actions of models. The results from the experiment changed the ideal of modern psychology. Albert is accredited for helping the ideal of in academic psychology from pure behaviorism to cognitive psychology. It focused on how young people are influenced by the actions of adults. The experiment is known as one of the most celebrated of psychological experiments, but was criticized by many on ethical grounds for training children towards aggression. During the student, when adults were praised for their aggressive behavior, the children were more likely to keep on hitting the doll. However, when the adults were punished for their actions, the children stopped hitting the doll as

well.
Albert Bandura applied his human view through social cognitive theory for the personal and social aspects. He stated that in the Social Cognitive Theory of the moral self, moral reasoning is linked to moral action through affective self-regulatory mechanisms by which moral agency is played out. He believes that all people are capable of two morally agentic abilities.
Mr. Bandura has received so many rewards and even a surplus of honorary degrees. To name a few it includes, The University of British Columbia, Alfred University, The University of Lethbridge, Indiana University, and Penn State University. He received the award for Distinguished Scientific Contributions from the American Psychological Association in 1980 for pioneering the research in the field of self-regulated learning. He received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association from the Advancement of Behavior Therapy. He is the recipient of the Outstanding Lifetime Contribution to Psychology Award from the American Psychological Association and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Western Psychological Association, The James McKeen Cattell Award from the American Psychological Society, and the Gold Medal Award for Distinguished Lifetime to Psychological Science from the American Psychological Foundation.