Self Efficacy Paper

Psychologist, Albert Bandura described self-efficacy as a person’s belief in their capabilities to organize and carry out the required courses of action to “manage prospective situations”. It therefore implies, that to succeed in a particular situation will rely in a person’s belief in their own ability to do so. According to the theory, “people’s judgment of self-efficacy in part determine what activities to undertake, how many resources to expend in the effort, and how long to persist in the face of obstacles or difficulties” (Bandura, 1982, 1986).
Self-efficacy beliefs determine how individuals feel, think, motivate themselves and behave across a wide variety of situation. In order words, those that do not believe they possess the skills
and ability to perform a task, will be discouraged when performance does not meet expectations, whereas, the ones that believe in their ability to reach and attain goals will increase their efforts until success is achieved.
This paper looks at individual’s commitment and behavior exercised towards a task that is difficult or heading for disaster and those that possess high self-efficacy in risky decision makings will increase commitment to failing projects.
They see the failures and risks as challenges to be mastered, rather than setbacks and they will maintain strong commitment to them. However, those with low self-efficacy, tends to stay away from difficult, risky tasks, they do not believe in their capabilities and thus, lose faith in themselves. They exhibit weak commitments to the goals that are chosen.
An examination on whether an individual’s level of self-esteem could also be responsible for escalating commitment, showed that “there is a consensus that self-esteem refers to individuals’ degree of like or dislike for themselves, or in other words, to the favorability of individuals’ typical self-evaluations” (Brockner, 1988).
Self-esteem’s roles in escalating commitment, according to findings, are inconsistent. The difference between self-esteem and self-efficacy was in fact the impact on escalating commitment. Also, controversy existed on whether self-efficacy is best conceptualized as a “situation and task-specific individual state or as a trait-like self-perception of the ability to meet the demands posed by disparate situations” (Eden, 1988). However, Bandura has argued that self-efficacy is related to specific performances and is varied across
tasks.
In the studies done, results shows that self-efficacy judgments do have a significant effect on motivation.
Self-efficacy beliefs affect life choices, levels of motivation, an individual’s resilience to adversity and even stress vulnerability. There are four main sources of influence and they are: mastery experiences, social modeling, social persuasion and psychological responses. Successful performance of tasks strengthens our commitment. Witnessing other people’s success at completing a task, encourages our beliefs that we can also possess the capabilities to do so. Encouragement and positive words focus help to overcome any self-doubt and how we react to our own situations can impact on our capabilities.