Educational Psychology—Limitations and Possibilities

54 The Praeger Handbook of Education and Psychology
vicarious experiences that inform the use of social and verbal behavior to alter social outcomes
and enhance self-efficacy. The peer context reinforces the child’s self-efficacy as the child learns
coping and problem-solving behaviors through the development of peer relationships.
Particularly applicable to educational psychology and critical theory is Bandura’s recognition
of the importance of self-efficacy in the school milieu for successful educational outcomes. For
Bandura, the school milieu is the place where individuals learn the knowledge, strategies, and skills
needed for successful participation in society. Self-efficacy is critical for mastery in the school
environment and the wider social environment. According to him, individuals possessing high
self-efficacy at academic task mastery will perform more successfully than individuals lacking
academic self-efficacy and will also perform better at activities outside the school environment.
Thus, those who come to school cognitively prepared will likely be successful in school, and their
academic success will increase their academic self-efficacy and motivate them to continue to do
well. For those students who enter the school setting with low academic self-efficacy, however,
their school experiences will likely serve to further decrease their self-efficacy and impede their
development, leaving them ill-prepared for the future. Thus, while educational practices such
as competitive grading and ability grouping may serve to enhance the self-efficacy of students
already possessing high levels of academic self-efficacy, these practices can also decrease the
self-efficacy of students entering school with low academic self-efficacy. Bandura’s recognition
of social influences on school performance disparities makes his theory compatible with critical
theorists who recognize the bidirectional influence of children’s individual characteristics and
social context on their school performance.
Adolescence, the next milieu in Bandura’s theory, involves cognitive skills of adaptation,
avoidance of health risk behaviors, and practice of forethought regarding potential career paths.
The adult milieu differs markedly from the adolescent milieu in that it involves the adoption and
management of social roles involving marriage, employment, and financial management. The
milieu of middle years involves stabilization of self-efficacy, but this stability is often reversed in
advancing age, however, as physical functioning and memory decline. For Bandura, self-efficacy
can be maintained in advancing age through reliance on differing levels of cognitive processes. For
example, memory functions may decline in advanced age, but levels of information integration
can remain consistent and levels of knowledge and expertise may increase.
Bandura’s theory of social cognition employs a pragmatic approach to cognitive functioning
that has real-world applicability; it recognizes fluidity in cognitive development whereby different
cognitive processes become relevant as one’s social, cultural, and temporal contexts change
throughout the life cycle. Social cognition theory recognizes the context specificity of cognitive
processes and allows for fluidity in the development and demonstration of cognitive functioning
across the life cycle. In this way, social cognition theory is compatible with postformal thought.
CONTRIBUTIONS
By presenting human beings as reflective, self-directed, and self-managing individuals capable
of adapting to changing environments with flexibility and adaptability, Bandura’s social cognitive
theory suggests a positive view of human existence. For him, both socially appropriate and socially
inappropriate behaviors result from social cognitive learning, not childhood trauma or unconscious
drives and impulses. As a result, maladaptive behaviors can be altered through appropriate
social modeling. His straightforward, efficient, and effective methodology for treating socially
inappropriate behaviors continues to have broad application in therapeutic and criminological
contexts.
Bandura suggests that maladaptive behaviors (e.g., aggression, phobias, and depressive psychological
states) arise through observational learning and persist because some reward (either