OCR AS Psychology: Core Studies - Bandura, Ross and Ross (3)

Stage 1: Children taken into the experimental room, which was set out for play with activities familiar to the children. In the non-aggressive condition the room was full of non-aggressive toys e.g. tea set, crayons and plastic farm animals. They left the bobo doll well alone and the children sat down and played quietly.

e.g. of physical aggression: Punching the doll in the nose

e.g. of verbal aggression: Repeating the phrases "Pow!" or "Sock him in the nose!"

Stage 2: Children were exposed to mild aggression arousal. The children were taken to a room where there were brand new, shiny toys e.g. fire engine, baby crib etc and they got the children all excited, but after 2 minutes the experimenter, stopped those children by telling them these toys had to be saved for other children. So they took them away. They did provide a common basis of arousal for all the children regardless of whether they had witnessedan aggressive or non-aggressive model at all.

Stage 3: The children were taken to the observation room. In this room these toys were present:

Non-aggressive toys: Tea set, crayons, plastic farm animals; Aggressive toys: Mallet and peg board, dart guns, 3 ft bobo doll. The children were observed for 20 minutes and were observed behind a one-way mirror every 5 seconds giving 240 responses for each child.