CASE CONCEPTUALIZATION

Strictly Confidential

From (Cervone) To answer the what, how, and why questions, the personality psychologist
addresses four distinct topics:
 (1) personality structure—the basic units or building blocks of personality; stable and
enduring aspects of personality; comparable to parts of the body or to concepts such as
atom or molecules in physics
 (2) personality process—the dynamic aspects of personality, including motives,
 (3) growth and development—how we develop into the unique person each of us is, and
 (4) psychopathology and behavior change—how people change and why they sometimes
resist change or are unable to change.

From (Ryckman) Assumptions of SCT

 Triadic Reciprocal Determinism (or causation)

From (Cervone) SCT vs Other Theories

 Psychoanalysts overemphasize unconscious forces and early childhood experience
o Sct emphasizes conscious self-reflection and argue that critical developmental
processes occur not only in early childhood but throughout the life course
 The core premise of trait theory “personality can be understood in terms of overall, average
tendencies” is questionable
o SCT believes that personality is reveled in both average levels of behavior and
patterns of variability in action.
o Are you shy with some people but outgoing with others? Motivated on some tasks
but lazy on others? Social-cognitive theory sees such variability as revealing of
personality structure (Mischel & Shoda, 2008).
 Evolutionary psychology is inadequate?
o Vast changes in human social life observed from one historical period to
another not adequately explained by evolutionary psychology
o A century ago, evolutionary psychologists might have explained why women are
evolutionarily predisposed to stay at home rather than entering the workforce. Now
that women have entered the workforce in massive numbers, such an explanation
makes little sense.
 Behaviorist argument that environmental stimuli controls behavior is rejected
o People have capacity for self control
o Cognitive abilities enable people to shape the course of their own
development
o These capabilities also allow people to learn new patterns of behavior by
observation or modeling even in the absence of reinforcement

Personality Structures (emphasized in SCT)

 Competencies and skills
 Expectancies and beliefs
 Behavioral standards
 Personal goals
These four personality variables refer to four distinct classes of cognition; they thus can be seen
as distinct subsystems within the overall system of personality. Any given person may have
different skills, beliefs, standards, and goals in different situations. Thus, behavior naturally varies
across situations in a meaningful manner that reflects the individual’s personality characteristics.

From (Feist) Related Research (The only new portion in the 9th edition)
  Moral disengagement and bullying
o Moral disengagement – after doing something bad, we convince ourselves that the
normal standards of morality does not apply to us in that situation
o Perceived collective moral disengagement – an individual’s belief that other people
also commonly engage in justifying bad behavior
o Both individual and student-perceived collective moral disengagement were uniquely
predictive of aggressive behavior toward peers

Lecture Outline
Introduction! CATCH THEM!
 Person is good at boxing
 How would personality theories explain this behavior?
o Psychodynamic  defense mechanism i.e. sublimation
o Humanistic  probably looking for esteem or recognition; satisfying esteem needs or
recognition
o Radical behaviorists  the person is engaging in boxing because the behavior is being
reinforced
 What if there’s more
Assumptions and Concepts of SCT
1. Humans have the flexibility to learn a variety of behaviors in diverse situations.
a. Observational Learning – learning by watching
i. Attention
ii. Retention
iii. Behavior Production
iv. Motivation
v. Remember acquisition is not equivalent to performance!
b. Enactive Learning - Enactive learning is learning by doing and experiencing the
consequences of your actions, which provide information.
i. Inform
ii. Motivate
iii. Reinforce
2. Humans have the capacity to regulate their lives through a triadic reciprocal causation model
(includes person, behavior, and environment factors). A SYSTEM!
a. NETFLIX AND CHILL (!) example
b. This model assumes that human action is a result of an interaction among three variables –
environment, behavior, and person.
c. What is the cause of behavior?
i. Traits  personality attributes?
ii. Behaviorists  environment?
iii. Bandura  it is not that simple! Let’s not be too simplistic! Causality is two-way or
reciprocal
iv. The three elements or factors are each a cause of each other --- they operate
interactively (an interactionist perspective) as determinants of each other. People do
not simply react to environmental events but they also actively create their own
environments and act and change them.
v. Cognitive events determine which environmental events will be perceived and how
they will be interpreted, organized, and acted on
vi. Positive or negative feedback from behavior influences people’s thinking (cognitions)
and the ways in which they act to change the environment
d. Netflix example!
i. P  E: Personal preference influence what you will watch from among the variety of
options
ii. B  P: Your actual watching behavior reshapes preferences concerning which
programs to watch in the future… your behavior also impinges or influences your
thoughts…
iii. B  E: your watching behavior determines to some extent the programming that
television executives will provide
iv. E P: the kind of programming offered by networks will shape preferences. Partially
determines cognition….
v. E B: the kind of programming offered by networks will shape behavior
vi. It’s also in the environment factor in which chance encounters and fortuitous
events enter the triad note that even though it’s in the E factor, your behavior
and person factor is
1. Up to fate? Chance encounters (unintended meeting of unfamiliar persons)
and fortuitous events (unexpected or unintended environmental
experiences) are not uncontrollable
2. You can make chance happen!
e. Swimming example
i. P  E: Say for example you’re a professional athlete (swimmer)  your age, status,
physique alone can evoke reactions from the environment
 1. Other neophyte swimmers might be shy to use the swimming pool when
you’re there
3. Humans have agency or capacity to control over the nature and quality of their lives.
a. Human agency is the ability to organize, regulate, and enact behaviors that can bring about
desired consequences.
b. Core features (distinctive quality) of human agency
i. Intentionality
ii. Forethought
iii. Self-reactiveness
iv. Self-reflectiveness
c. Self-efficacy
i. Is not equivalent to self-esteem – although there may be a relationship between the
two
1. Self-esteem refers to people’s overall (or “global”) evaluation of their
personal worth. Perceived self-efficacy, in contrast, refers to people’s
appraisals of what they are capable of accomplishing in a given setting. Thus,
perceived self-efficacy differs from self-esteem in two ways: (1) Perceived
self-efficacy is not a global variable; instead, it is recognized that people
commonly will have different self-efficacy perceptions in different situations.
(2) Perceived self-efficacy is not an abstract sense of personal worth but a
judgment of what one can do.
ii. Is not equivalent to outcome expectations
1. Social-cognitive theory contends that efficacy expectations generally are
more important than are outcome expectations as a determinant of
behavior.
2. If people lack a sense of efficacy for accomplishing something, the rewards
associated with accomplishing that goal are probably irrelevant to them.
iii. People with a higher sense of self-efficacy are more likely to decide to attempt
difficult tasks, to persist in their efforts, to be calm rather than anxious during task
performance, and to organize their thoughts in an analytical manner. In contrast,
people who question their own capabilities for performance may fail even to
attempt valuable activities, may give up when the going gets rough, tend to become
anxious during task performance, and often become rattled and fail to think and act
in a calm, analytical manner (colloquially speaking, one might say that a person with
a low sense of self-efficacy tends to choke on difficult activities).
d. Proxy agency – indirect control
e. Collective efficacy
4. Humans regulate their behavior through both external and internal factors.
5. Humans have moral agency but they can also disengage.
a. Selective activation
b. Disengagement of internal control

Dysfunctional behavior
1. Depression
2. Phobia
3. Aggression

Therapy:
- Goal: self-regulation
- Techniques: overt or vicarious modeling, covert or cognitive modeling (visualizing), enactive
mastery
Applications and critique
 Health behavior change
 Global problems (e.g. overpopulation, climate change, etc)

In the Philippine context:

 Reyes & Resurreccion (2015):
o The models tested in this paper together show the intertwining of social relations and
agentic capabilities both in the family and in the self. Thus is the self inextricably linked to
social participation. The self develops through meaningful interpersonal relations and,
conversely, prosocial engagement is made possible through the development of an agentic
self (Altarejos et al., 2008). The results of the current study provide contextual evidence for
social cognitive theory’s general claim that psychological and sociostructural theories need
not pose as rival explanations of human behaviour, and for the specific claim that social
structures and personal agency interdependently influence a person’s actions (Bandura,
2000).
 Espina & Calleja (2015): disaster preparedness
o This study looked at the individual and environmental factors that influence disaster
preparedness. Findings supported our hypotheses that disaster preparedness behavior is
predicted by individual (i.e., risk perception and severity of disaster experience) and
environmental (i.e., community disaster preparedness) factors. Results validate the
assumptions of social cognitive theory (SCT) that personal and environmental factors
determine an individual’s behavior (Wood & Bandura, 1989) as applied to disaster
preparations.
o Person / Cognition  risk perception
o Environment  values & norms (i.e. pakikisama, bayanihan)
 If community is preparing for an impending disaster, one will prepare as well so as
not to be perceived as hindi marunong makisama (unable to get along with others)
 Scholz et al., 2002: Perceived self-efficacy as a universal construct
o Looked at general self-efficacy in 25 countries including collectivist-oriented countries
o However they also observed that self-efficacy tends to be lower in countries such as that of
Japan  they suggest that the collective-oriented culture may explain this. Hard work and
effort is more highly valued than ability in collectivistic cultures. Therefore self-efficacy
maybe rated lower in collectivistic cultures than in individualistic cultures.
 Prieler, M., & Centeno, D. (2013):
o Gender Representation in Philippine Television Advertisements. Sex Roles, 69(5-6), 276–
288. doi:10.1007/s11199-013-0301-4
o this study has shown that Philippine television advertising remains geared toward the norms
of the nation’s tradition and culture, which continue to manifest a patriarchal framework.
These results are in line with studies on more traditional and developing countries.
o Possible effects of such representation audiences are discussed based on social cognitive
theory and cultivation theory

Critique:
As a theory
 Ability to generate research: very high
 Openness to falsification: high
 Ability to organize data: high
 Guide to action or therapy: high
 Internal consistency: high
 Parsimony: high