Q.A good role model is very important for a growing up child. Discuss the kind of learning that supports it.

Observational learning is a form of learning that takes place simply by watching others, without the observer's own behaviour needing to be directly reinforced at all. Earlier called imitation, it was investigated in detail by Albert Bandura and his colleagues and is often referred to as social learning, since it accounts for a large part of how human beings acquire behaviour appropriate to social situations; the underlying process of observing and reproducing another person's behaviour is called modeling.

Bandura's classic demonstration used a short film shown to different groups of children, depicting an adult model behaving aggressively toward a large "Bobo" doll — hitting, throwing, and kicking it. The film existed in three versions: in one, the model was shown being rewarded and praised for this aggression; in a second, the model was shown being punished for it; and in a third, no consequence for the model was shown at all. After viewing their assigned version, children from all three groups were separately placed in a room with similar toys and secretly observed. Children who had seen the model rewarded were the most aggressive; those who had seen the model punished were the least aggressive. This result demonstrates a crucial distinction at the heart of observational learning: observers acquire knowledge of a behaviour simply by watching a model perform it, but whether they actually display (perform) that behaviour themselves depends heavily on whether the model's behaviour was seen to have pleasant or unpleasant consequences — learning and performance are, once again, not the same thing. …