Theories of Depression by 4 Geniuses

Albert Bandura - The Social Learning Theory
In his Social Learning theory, Banduras implies that aggression is learned through behavior modeling. Bandura in his theory believes that individuals do not inherit violent tendencies they are rather moldered. He argues that individuals, especially children learn aggressive responses from observing those around, whether it be personally, through the media or environment. Moreover, the theory states that aggression will produce reinforcements, reduction of tension, financial rewards, praise of others, or building one’s self esteem. Bandura, through his Bobo doll experiment is able to show that children imitate the aggression of adults because of rewards. Bandura was intrigued by children’s aggression and asked himself whether aggression in children would be reflected in their adult years, would they turn into criminals? He argued that aggression in children is shaped by reinforcement offered by the family and their environment as a whole.

Julian Rotter – The Social Learning Theory
Julian Rotter in his Social Learning theory explains that personality represents an interaction of an individual with his or her environment. He says that one cannot speak of a personality internal to the individual, it should rather be reflected as independent of his or her environment. Rotter also shows that behavior should not be considered to being an automatic response to an objective set of environmental stimuli. One must rather, take both the individual and the environment into account. Personality, according to Julian Rotter is a stable set of potentials for responding to situations in a unique way. Personality is therefore considered to be changeable. Rotter strongly believes that the more life experience one has on building a set of beliefs, the more effort and intervention is required for personality to change. He seem to be quite optimistic on the subject, he sees people as being drawn by their goals who seek to maximize their life style rather than avoiding punishment. The theory has to it 4 main components: behavior potential, expectancy, reinforcement value, and psychological situation.

Martin Seligman – Learned Helplessness Theory
Seligman, an American psychologist decided to challenge B.F. Skinner’s behaviorism theory by conducting an experiment with three individual groups. The first group was the control group, out of 150 dogs, a group was places in harnesses for a set period of time and then released. Group two dogs were put in pairs; one dog in a pair would receive mild electrical shocks. The dog could end pain of electrical shock by pressing a lever. Group three dogs were also put in pairs and one dog would be wired in parallel with a dog in group two, who was receiving shocks. The dog would therefore receive group two’s dog electrical shock but his own lever couldn’t stop the shock, group three dogs received a shock that was inescapable. Groups one and two dogs recovered quickly but group three dogs didn’t, they presented depression and learned to be helpless. Through this experiment Seligman developed this theory, which showed that people learn to be helpless when given a task a being miserable at it. A term that also shows this is the vicarious trauma. Learned helplessness as shown by Seligman is the state of mind created by an animal or human in which they learn to behave helpless even with the means to escape or avoid an unpleasant situation. The theory states that it facing helplessness, mental illnesses may arise from the lack of control one has over a situation.

Aaron Beck – Cognitive Behavior Theory
Aaron Temkin Beck is an American psychiatrist who has developed research on psychotherapy, psychopathology, suicide and more. He is considered the father of cognitive behavioral therapy. Indeed, he developed a cognitive behavior theory in which he states, “If beliefs do not change, there is no improvement. If beliefs change, symptoms change. Beliefs function as little operational units”. Beck shows through this theory that dysfunctional behavior is caused due to dysfunctional thinking and that basically thinking is shaped by our beliefs. Moreover, he says our beliefs decide the course of our actions. They take hold of our actions. Aaron Beck shows that patients can be persuaded to think constructively and reject negative thinking.

Works Cited:
Isom, Margaret Delores. "Theorist - Albert Bandura." Criminology.fsu. 30 Nov. 1998. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. .
Mearns, Jack. "The Social Learning Theory of Julian B. Rotter." Psych.fullerton.edu. 30 Nov. 2000. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. .
Pollick, Michael. "What Is Learned Helplessness?" Wise Geek. 25 Feb. 2011. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. .
"Aaron Beck Cognitive Behavior Theory." Buzzle.com. Google. Web. 27 Mar. 2011. .