Albert Bandura’s research while affiliated with Stanford University and other places

A major challenge to von Hippel & Trivers's evolutionary analysis of self-deception is the paradox that one cannot deceive oneself into believing something while simultaneously knowing it to be false. The authors use biased information seeking and processing as evidence that individuals knowingly convince themselves of the truth of their falsehood. Acting in ways that keep one uninformed about unwanted information is self-deception. Acting in selectively biasing and misinforming ways is self-bias.

This article addresses positive psychology from the agentic perspective of social cognitive theory. There is a difference between pursuing happiness and achieving it through meaningful pursuits. Perceived well-being and satisfaction are derived from how one lives one's life not just from episodic good feelings or transient pleasures. Social cognitive theory addresser well-being and satisfaction in terms of commitment to a valued future and enablement to take the steps to realise it. The state of one's satisfaction and well-being is determined, in large part, relationally rather than solely by objective life conditions. Self-satisfaction and subjective well-being are rooted in temporal comparison on whether one's life is better or worse than in the past; social comparison on whether the quality of one's life compares favourably or unfavourably with the quality of life others enjoy; and aspirational comparison on how one's life status measures against the life ambition one set for oneself

Self-efficacy is defined and refined initially and most notably in the work of behavioral psychologist A. Bandura as the belief or judgment made by an individual that they can succeed or accomplish an identified task. Three decades of research have further developed the concept of generalized self-efficacy as the belief that one could be successful on a non-specific, global task, and specific self-efficacy as the belief that one can complete a task-specific behavior. Furthermore, researchers in this area provide empirical evidence that self-efficacy is an accurate predictor of a student's skill acquisition, rate of performance, expenditure of energy, persistence, goal setting, and self monitoring of goals. The following paper reviews the research on self-efficacy as an academic tool for the teacher. In addition, a Self-Efficacy Scale developed by M. Sherer is presented as an additional assessment tool. Finally, a suggestion on teaching tips using a communication and behavioral model to foster general academic self-efficacy in the classroom is outlined.

Psychological theories have traditionally emphasized learning through the rewarding and punishing effects that actions produce. Natural endowment provides humans with enabling biological systems but few inborn skills. Competencies must be developed over long periods and altered to fit changing conditions over the life course. Direct experience is a tough teacher, because errors can be highly costly and some types of missteps are deadly. If knowledge and competencies could be acquired only by direct experience, human development would be severely retarded, not to mention unmercifully tedious and perilous. A given culture could never transmit the complexities of its language, mores, social practices, and essential competencies if they had to be shaped laboriously in each new member solely by response consequences, without the benefit of models to exemplify the cultural patterns. The abbreviation of the acquisition process is, therefore, vital for survival as well as for successful human development. Moreover, the constraints of time, resources, and mobility impose severe limits on the situations and activities that can be directly explored for the acquisition of knowledge and competencies.

We analyze mechanisms of moral disengagement used to eliminate moral consequences by industries whose products or production practices are harmful to human health. Moral disengagement removes the restraint of self-censure from harmful practices. Moral self-sanctions can be selectively disengaged from harmful activities by investing them with socially worthy purposes, sanitizing and exonerating them, displacing and diffusing responsibility, minimizing or disputing harmful consequences, making advantageous comparisons, and disparaging and blaming critics and victims. Internal industry documents and public statements related to the research activities of these industries were coded for modes of moral disengagement by the tobacco, lead, vinyl chloride (VC), and silicosis-producing industries. All but one of the modes of moral disengagement were used by each of these industries. We present possible safeguards designed to protect the integrity of research.

The present study examined the developmental course of perceived efficacy for self-regulated learning and its contribution to academic achievement and likelihood of remaining in school in a sample of 412 Italian students (48% males and 52% females ranging in age from 12 to 22 years). Latent growth curve analysis revealed a progressive decline in self-regulatory efficacy from junior to senior high school, with males experiencing the greater reduction. The lower the decline in self-regulatory efficacy, the higher the high school grades and the greater the likelihood of remaining in high school controlling for socioeconomic status. Reciprocal cross-lagged models revealed that high perceived efficacy for self-regulated learning in junior high school contributed to junior high school grades and self-regulatory efficacy in high school, which partially mediated the relation of junior high grades on high school grades and the likelihood of remaining in school. Socioeconomic status contributed to high school grades only mediationally through junior high grades and to school drop out both directly and mediationally through junior high grades. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)

Vicarious Extinction of Phobic BehaviourVicarious Extinction as a Function of Multiple ModellingComparative Efficacy of Modelling and Desensitization Treatment ApproachesMechanisms Underlying Vicarious ExtinctionSUMMARY

This chapter reconstrues "free will" in terms of the exercise of personal control through cognitive and self-regulative processes. In this conception, psychosocial functioning is the product of a dynamic triadic interplay of intrapersonal, behavioral, and environmental determinants. Within this triadic determination, deliberative thought not only alters the relation between environmental influences and behavioral outcomes, but fosters courses of action that change the physical and social environments. Because personal influence is part of the determining conditions, individuals have a hand in shaping the course of events. Individuals are neither aware of nor directly control neuronal mechanisms. Rather, they exercise second-order control. By intentionally engaging in activities over which they exercise direct control, they indirectly shape the functional structure and enlist the subserving neuronal events in the service of diverse purposes.

AB The present study examined the developmental course of perceived efficacy for self-regulated learning and its contribution to academic achievement and likelihood of remaining in school in a sample of 412 Italian students (48% males and 52% females ranging in age from 12 to 22 years). Latent growth curve analysis revealed a progressive decline in self-regulatory efficacy from junior to senior high school, with males experiencing the greater reduction. The lower the decline in self-regulatory efficacy, the higher the high school grades and the greater the likelihood of remaining in high school controlling for socioeconomic status. Reciprocal cross-lagged models revealed that high perceived efficacy for self-regulated learning in junior high school contributed to junior high school grades and self-regulatory efficacy in high school, which partially mediated the relation of junior high grades on high school grades and the likelihood of remaining in school. Socioeconomic status contributed to high school grades only mediationally through junior high grades and to school drop out both directly and mediationally through junior high grades. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) (journal abstract)

Cahill, Gallo, Lisman, and Weinstein (2006) adopta conception of "ability" as possessing rudimentary components in a behavioral repertoire. This view is at odds with what constitutes an ability and misrepresents the construct of perceived self-efficacy. To verify their hypothesis concerning the relation between ratings of ability and willingness in "fear-based" and "skill-based" tasks, they deliberately instruct participants in the hypothesis before testing it. This is an egregious violation of the scientific method. The present commentary clarifies the construct of self-efficacy, documents flaws in the Cahill et al. experimentation, reviews diverse lines of research that disputes their causal claims, and comments on their expansive generalizations and recommendations to extend their intentionially biasing rating procedure to other activity domains. In a paper concerning the construal and assessment of perceived self-efficacy, Cahill et al. (2006) present a simplistic conception of self-efficacy examined with flawed experimentation. Their study of the construct provides an opportunity to restate the conceptualization of this self-belief system and to evaluate the methodology of the study they conducted.