Bobo Doll Experiment

Bandura's study in which children who watched an adult beat an inflatable doll imitated the aggression, novel acts included.

Specifications & Metrics

type

Developmental

year

1961

lead

Albert Bandura

participants

72 children

Relative Scale in Studies

Core Principles & Analysis

• Seventy-two children aged three to six watched aggressive or calm adults, then played in a room with the same Bobo doll.
• Children exposed to aggressive models imitated the violence and invented new aggressive acts of their own.
• The study grounded social learning theory's claim that behavior spreads by observation, not only conditioning.

Sources

• Bandura, Ross & Ross (1961) — DOI 10.1037/h0045925