See Aggression…Do Aggression Is aggression biological, or is it stimulated by our surroundings? Bandura theorized that aggression is a learned behavior. Bandura and Ross proceeded with this hypothesis in 1961 at Stanford University. Their study is commonly known as “The Bobo Doll Study” and consisted of 72 children ranging from three to six years old. Subjects were split into three groups, a control group (CG), an aggression group (AG) and a non-aggression group (NAG). The control group had 24 children who received no treatment, and the remaining subjects were divided into the AG and NAG, based upon gender. Bandura & Ross hypothesized children who observed adults being aggressive would mimic their behavior, children who were exposed to non-aggressive adults would be less aggressive than either the children exposed to aggression or the control group, and children would imitate the behavior of the same sex model to a greater degree
than the opposite sex model. They also believed being aggressive is viewed as a masculine behavior, so the boys would be predisposed to being aggressive. In this experiment all three groups were given the same set of toys including the Bobo doll. The CG received no adult model. The NAG received and adult modeling typical child play behaviors. The AG received an adult modeling aggressive play such as punching, verbal aggression, throwing, hitting the doll with a mallet and pretending to shoot the Bobo doll. The treatments for each group were repeated three times, then all children were taken into another room and given the option of
playing with whatever toys they wanted. Shortly after, subjects in the AG were told the toys were reserved for the other children, but they could play with the toys in the room they were
previously in. Later Subjects were allowed twenty minutes of playtime while being observed through a one-way mirror. Subjects from all groups were allowed to play in a room one at a time with both normal toys including the Bobo doll. Bandura, Ross, & Ross found that subjects exposed to aggressive behaviors modeled the same aggressive behaviors. AG subjects overall had more instances of aggressive play than those in either CG or NAG. Male subjects were more likely to model physical aggression whereas the female subjects were more likely to model verbal aggression.
Further studies also concluded that aggression could be a learned behavior. Implications for psychology include adult behaviors influence children’s behaviors and aggression can be a learned behavior.