Examples Of Social Cognitive Theory

Social Cognitive Theory expands the range of treatment targets beyond patriarchal socialization to include additional factors associated with sexual coercion in empirical research including the influence of social norms, and a lack of confidence in one’s abilities and skills (Wolfe et al., 2012;Eckhardt et al., 2013). Such theories include the Health Belief Model, Theories of Reasoned Action and Planned Behaviour, Social Cognitive Theory, and the Transtheoretical Model. While many of these theories are similar but may use different terminology, the key elements of each include education and skill building and perceived behavioural control self-efficacy (Noar & Zimmerman, 2005).
Interventions based on Social Cognitive Theory aim to reduce

Judgments of personal efficacy affect an individual’s choice of actions. For instance, people tend to avoid activities and situations they believe to be beyond their capabilities, but they are more likely to engage in activities they believe themselves capable of handling (Bandura, 1997). Thus, self-efficacy functions as a self-fulfilling prophecy as individuals who doubt their ability to achieve a satisfactory outcome in a particular situation will fail to even try to achieve their goals. Self-efficacy also influences how much effort and commitment an individual will take to perform a task. For example, research has shown how self-efficacy relates to the effort people will make to successfully change and maintain virtually every behaviour crucial to health, including exercise, diet, stress management, safe sex, smoking cessation, overcoming alcohol abuse, and compliance with treatment and prevention regimens (Bandura, 1997;Good & Abraham, 2011;Floyd, 2006). All of the major theories of health behaviour, such as protection motivation theory, the health belief model and the theory of reasoned action/planned behaviour include self-efficacy as a key component (Maddux, 2009). However, Bandura’s self-efficacy model is the most widely

A mastery experience is when a person is convinced they have personal control over a situation (Bandura, 1997). A sense of mastery can be damaged when an individual is subjected to a sexually coercive experience and leads to increased levels of helplessness and ability to cope in such situations (Benight & Bandura, 2004). An individual’s sense of mastery to be able to control coercive encounters can be improved by skill development to boost an individual’s sense of self-efficacy (Schwarzer, 2014). It has been suggested that as adolescents have little experience in dealing with relationship problems particular attention should be paid to their verbal or communication skills (Akers, 2011). This can be most effective by breaking down difficult steps into small steps that are easy to ensure progressive mastery of the skill (Dowd & Tierney,