Question

Social cognitive theory posits that human functioning results from reciprocal interactions among personal factors, such as cognitions, emotions, behaviors, and environmental conditions. It contends that learners set goals that they feel self-efficacious about attaining and believe that when attained will result in positive outcomes. Bandura's theory identifies two types of expectations—outcome expectation and efficacy expectation. Outcome expectations are beliefs about the likely consequences of actions (Bandura, 1986).Efficacy expectations, or self-efficacy, refer to personal beliefs about an individual's capabilities to learn or perform actions at designated levels (Bandura, 1997).

Based on your understanding of the above and relevant research, answer the following questions:

What is self-efficacy and what is the self-efficacy model based on?

Answer 1

- Albert Bandura gave this concept in 1977 in his article after observing other's work and experiments like bobo doll experiment saying that social learning theory depicts direct correlation between the self efficacy as perceived by the individual and the significant change in behaviour of the individuals and later transformed into what it is today called as social cognitive theory.

- According to Bandura self efficacy refers to a person's self belief in the his/her competence or in simple words- confidence to fulfill a task or obtain desired outcome. It is sometimes also refrred to as innate ability of individuals to accomplish certain purpose. In social cognitive theory , Bandura gave the concept of exoectation of self efficacy which means that the individual decide to whether to engage in coping actions and the duration upto which they are willing to try to overcome the situations. Bandura stated that self efficacy is actually a personal judgement made by individual on how to handle situations and how well they do to acheive the desired goal consistently.

- The self efficacy model is based on the four sources of self efficacy which were elaborated by Albert Bandura. He emphasized on these four beliefs:

1. Performance outcomes/ Mastery experiences- it is defined by the beliefs strenegthened by successful accomplishment of certain task which proves to be a source of self efficacy. When individuals become good at certain tasks and have mastery over it, it gives a senese of achievement giving individuals strong self efficacy beliefs based on their performance outcomes.

2. Verbal persuasion- It simply refers to the individual surrounded by other people who are a source of motivationa nd inspiration to the individual. It involves parents, friends and peer groups who encourage individual via verbal communication and often persuading the individual to acheive a certain task, this makes individual to work in that direction and put extra effort to accomplish the task.

3. Vicarious experience- Observing individuals around , those who are considered as role models or potential competitors who are doing good than the individuals, it gives a sense to the individuals that if they can do it, the individuals can also do the same and kind of realisation of self potential is there. So, through such experiences , individuals are driven forward and it is also a source of slef efficacy.

4. Physiological feedback/emotional states- Healthy physical state and mental well being is also considered as a impactful source of self efficacy. If individuals feel any kind of mental stress or suffer from severe injuries or diseases, it hampers the self efficacy of the individuals whereas if the individuals are healthy in both the states it improves confidence of the individuals.