Social Learning Theory (SLT) emphasises the importance of observing behaviours and modelling ourselves on these behaviours. The theory suggests that we learn to become aggressive by observing, this is controlled by environmental influences. Bandura (1961) conduced a study on a group of 36 boys and 36 girls; these children were divided into 8 groups of 6 with the remainder making up the control group. There were two conditions – the aggressive and non-aggressive. In the aggressive condition an adult model entered the room and attacked a bobo doll whilst the children watched, the model attacked the doll both with various weapons (mallet, hammer) and verbally. In the non-aggressive condition the adult ignored the bobo doll. Bandura found that the children in the aggressive condition were significantly more aggressive when compared to the other two conditions. 70% of those children in the other conditions showed no signs of aggressive at all. Bandura concluded that the observation of other’s behaviours leads to imitative learning. However, this study does have limitations; the children’s aggressiveness was only limited to a bobo doll, meaning that this was not real aggression. Adding to this, the experiment lacks ecological validity because real life is rarely as clear-cut as this, therefore it is difficult to generalise these findings. IN addition to this Bandura only used adult models; the children were basing their actions on what adults had done, but would these results be the same had they observed children? This study has also been criticised, as it is vulnerable to demand characteristics, as some of the children felt like they were expected to attack the doll. Despite these limitations, the study was well executed and planned, and clearly showed that the children had learned their behaviour.
