PersonalitySocial Cognitive approach

Social Cognitive- Bandura• understanding

personality involves considering the situation and thoughts before, during, and after an event

Albert Bandura (1925- )

• People learn by observing and modeling others or through reinforcement

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• personalities are created by both internal and environmental influences

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Do we control our environment, or does the environment control us?

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

–Internal locus of control means that we control our own destiny and behaviors

–External locus of control means that our personalities and behaviors are shaped by outside forces

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Stresses conscious thought process.

• Self regulation and importance of situational influences.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Do you act/behave the same at home and at school?

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Is your conscious thought different in situations?–Is there a class you are “acing”?

How do you feel?

–How about class you are failing?

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• People will actively process info from their social experience; info will influence goals, expectations, beliefs, and behavior, as well as the specific environment they choose.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Relies heavily on experimental studies.

• Emphasizes cognitive mental process rather than unconsciousness

• Emphasizes that sense of self can change…depending on…

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• ……Thoughts

• environment

• and behaviors

Reciprocal Determinism: Three Factors Shape Personality

• The mutual influences among personality and environmental factors

• An interaction of three factors:

–Thoughts or cognitions

–The environment

–A person’s behaviorsb

Reciprocal Determinism

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• We learn behavior from observing them.

• We learn consequences as well.

• Rules and standards apply to certain behaviors.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Reciprocal determination-human behavior and personality as being caused by the interaction of behavioral cognitive and environmental factors.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Self-Esteem-comes from a person/s cognitive skills, abilities, and attitudes.

• It is our self-system that guides how we perceive and react to different situations.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Self-efficacy-degree to which you are subjectively convinced of your own capabilities and effectiveness in meeting demands of a particular situation.

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• i.e.: Tim the “Tool Man” Taylor–Thinks he can do anything

*Versus*

• A person feels they can’t fix anything

Social-Cognitive Approach to Personality

• Tackle any academic work

• Frowns on physical

• Tackle a sport

• Says can’t do academic

External Locus of Control

• The perception that chance, or forces beyond a person’s control, control one’s fate

Internal Locus of Control

• The perception that we control our own fate

Learned Helplessness

• The hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated bad events

• Martin Seligman studied dogs that were unable to escape a painful stimulus and eventually stopped trying to escape.

Learned Helplessness

Optimistic Explanatory Style

• When something goes wrong the person explains the problem as:

– Temporary

– Not their fault

– Something limited to this situation

Pessimistic Explanatory Style

• When something goes wrong the person tends to:

– Blame themselves

– Catastrophize the event

– See the problem as beyond their control

Positive Psychology

• A movement in psychology that focuses on the study of optimal human functioning and the factors that allow individuals and communities to thrive

• Lead by Martin Seligman

The Social-Cognitive Perspective:

Assessing Behavior in Situations

Module 26: Trait and Social-Cognitive Perspectives on Personality

Assessing Personality

• Social-cognitive perspective would stress putting people into simulated actual conditions to determine how they would behave

The Social-Cognitive Perspective:

Evaluating the Perspective

Module 26: Trait and Social-Cognitive Perspectives on Personality

Social-Cognitive View

• Draws on learning and cognitive research

• Fails to consider the influence of emotions and motivation on behavior