ABSTRACT
Many species demonstrate observational learning. Bandura described observational learning as requiring attention to the details of a model’s behavior, retention of the information necessary to repeat the behavior, the physical skills necessary to perform the behavior, and the motivation to do so. Perceived similarity to self and reinforcement value are powerful variables influencing the likelihood of humans attending to a model. Memory was described as a reconstructive as opposed to reproductive process. Often imitation occurs as the result of rehearsing, storing, and retrieving verbal codes.
Remaining Stone-Age hunter-gatherer tribes, all of whom speak, demonstrate that the human advances and inventions occurring over the past 13,000 years were not inevitable. Our species by 172necessity maintains a nomadic existence unless agriculture and domestication of large animals is possible. As indicated in Hockett’s list of the features of language, speech may be used to represent past experiences and describe alternate futures. Language creates a symbolic reality for human beings enabling us to escape the here and now. Adaptive learning principles explain the acquisition of word meaning, grammatical verbal behavior, reading, and writing.
