The Bobo doll experiment and aggression

Between 1961 and 1963, the Canadian psychologist Albert Bandura conducted an experiment to analyze the behavior of children when seeing adult models showing aggressive behavior towards a doll. In fact, the Bobo doll experiment is the empirical demonstration of one of his best-known theories, the theory of social learning.

This theory states that a good part of human learning occurs through contact with the social environment. By observing others, certain knowledge, skills, strategies, beliefs and attitudes are acquired. Thus, each individual learns about the usefulness, convenience and consequences of various behaviors by fixating on certain models and acts in accordance with what he believes he should expect as a result of his actions.

Bandura’s research

Albert Bandura is considered one of the greatest eminences in the field of social learning. He has received the title of Doctor Honoris Causa from universities in different countries for his contributions to psychology. An investigation carried out in 2002 placed Bandura in fourth place among the most cited reference psychologists of all time, after Skinner, Freud and Piaget.

Bandura did not agree with the behaviorists’ position because he considered that it underestimated the social dimension of human behavior. Thus, focused his study on the interaction between the learner and the environment to explain learning processes.

In 1961, this researcher began to analyze different methods to treat excessively aggressive children, identifying the origin of violence in the behaviors they exhibited. For it, launched his famous and world-known research: The Bobo doll experiment. Let’s see what it’s about next.

The Bobo doll experiment

Albert Bandura, with the aim of providing an empirical basis for his theory, developed this experiment. The results obtained changed the course of psychology at the time, since the Bobo doll experiment was pioneering in terms of aggressive behavior in children.

Study characteristics

The basis on which the experimental process was based consisted of demonstrating that certain behaviors were learned by the little ones by imitating actions of adult models. 36 boys and 36 girls, between 3 and 5 years old, participated in the study. They were all students at Stanford University Kindergarten.

The children were organized into 3 groups: 24 were exposed to the aggressive model, 24 to the non-aggressive model and the rest to the control group. The groups were in turn divided by sex (boys and girls). And the researchers made sure that half of the children were exposed to the actions of adults of the same sex and the other half to some of the opposite sex.

Individually, both in the aggressive and non-aggressive group, each child was an observer of the behavior of an adult towards the Bobo doll (an inflatable plastic doll about one and a half meters high, which regained its balance when swung).

Predictions

Bandura made several key predictions about what would happen during the Bobo doll experiment.

Boys would behave more aggressively than girls.Children who observed an adult acting aggressively would likely act aggressively even when the adult model was not present.Children are more likely to imitate same-sex models than opposite-sex models.Children who observed the nonaggressive adult model would be less aggressive than children who observed the aggressive model. The non-aggressive exposure group would also be less aggressive than the control group.

Procedure

In the aggressive model scenario, the adult began by playing with the toys in the room for approximately one minute. After this time the model began aggressive behavior towards the doll, hitting it or using a toy hammer to hit it in the face.

In the non-aggressive model, the adult simply played with the doll. And finally, In the control group there was no previous observation of interaction with any model.

Later, the children were passing one by one to the room with the toys and the Bobo doll. These were recorded with cameras to record their behavior after having contemplated the ways of acting of the adult models.

Conclusions

Bandura determined that children exposed to the aggressive model were more likely to act physically aggressive than those who were not exposed to said model.

Regarding the results referring to gender differences, these strongly supported Bandura’s prediction that children were more influenced by models of their gender.

Furthermore, among the children who had been present in the aggressive model scenario, the number of physical attacks exhibited was greater in boys than in girls. That is, boys showed more aggression when exposed to aggressive male models.

Other notable results were:

There was more partial and non-imitative aggression among those children who had observed aggressive behavior, although the difference for non-imitative aggression was small.Girls in the aggressive model condition also showed more physical aggressive responses if the model was male, but more verbal aggressive responses if the model was female. However, the exception to this general pattern was the observation of how often Bobo was hit, and in this case the effects of gender were reversed.Boys were more likely to imitate same-sex models than girls. The evidence that girls imitate same-sex models is not strong.

Later investigations

On the other hand, something similar to the Bobo doll experiment was carried out in 1965 to establish the effects of rewarding or punishing erroneous and violent behavior. The conclusions obtained validated the theory of learning by observation; And when adults are rewarded for their violent behavior, children are more likely to continue hitting the doll. However, when the adults are reprimanded, the children consequently stop hitting the Bobo doll.

Criticism of the Bobo doll experiment

As in all theories, Bandura’s social learning was not exempt from criticism. Specifically, this experiment received the following:

It was pointed out that the subjects of the experiment were all children of Stanford students, from affluent class and exclusively Caucasian, which limited the sample to very specific racial and socioeconomic parameters. The duration of the experiment was also criticized, since between the studies carried out in 1961 and 1963, a multitude of external influences and unknown factors could have acted on the children, not counting their own maturation.The subjects could have acted in this violent manner not necessarily out of vicarious aggression.but also by mere imitation of adults or a desire to please them.The shape and characteristics of the doll expressly invited people to push and hit it.which would destroy the external validity of the experiment.In 2001 it was discovered that the frontal lobe does not develop significantly until the age of 8.which would prevent children from judging the value of their actions and separating reality from fantasy. And of course, it was pointed out that the theory of social learning that was trying to be tested in this experiment It underestimated the vital influence of personality traits of genetic origin, the level of brain development and differences in learning.

As we see, Children tend to imitate what they see in their models or reference figures, For this reason it is very important to take care of the behaviors and attitudes that we carry out both in the family and educational environment.

You might be interested…