One social psychological theory of aggression is the social learning theory. This theory suggests that people and especially children are heavily influenced by things they view. It says that these people internalise witnessed behaviour and imitate it due to visible positive reinforcement. The theory was proposed by Bandura and is based on a few principals. First of all attention must be paid to the person they witness and several factors including status, attractiveness and age effect how much they notice the behaviour. Secondly retention must be present i.e. remembering the behaviour clearly. They should also be able to reproduce the actions witnessed as many people would simply not have the physical ability to produce some acts of aggression. Lastly they must have a certain motivation to imitate the behaviour such as if the reward is greater than the punishment. Bandura said that the more successful aggressive behaviour is and the more reward they receive they will grow in self efficacy (self perceived ability to perform) and therefore continue to act in this way.
There is several support studies for this theory. Philips found that when researching the daily homicide rate in the USA it was always increased just after a major boxing match. This shows that people may imitate behaviour they have witnessed (seeing violence earn victory, fame and money). This study however could be criticised as cause and effect cannot be established. This means that we cannot say for certain that the increase in violence was directly related to the violence witnessed as there are thousands of other factors that could affect the homicide rate. Banduras Bobo doll study is a strong supporting study for this theory. In this study 72 children were split into two groups, one viewed aggressive acts of an adult hitting and verbally abusing a Bobo doll, the other group saw the role model not reacting with the Bobo doll. The children were then lead into another room where they had the...