Many people are aware of observational learning, but may not be aware of how it exactly works and what needs to happen in order for it to be successful. Obviously, people can learn through observation; however, in order for humans and/or animals to learn through observation, mirror neurons need to be present and active in the brain. Mirror neurons are neurons that fire in the brain when a human performs an action but also when that human observes the same action being done by another human. The neuron’s purpose is to basically mirror the action being done so when it comes time for the human to perform an action on their own, they have this information already stored in the brain and do not need assistance. Within observational learning, there are four elements that are key to its success, these steps include the following: attention (must notice it), memory (must remember it), imitation (must be able to do it), and motivation (must have the desire). When describing these four elements, the word “it” refers to the action being performed.
The real-life experience that I can apply to observational learning is how I learned how to cook and bake. My parents are both big cookers, my mom also loves to bake, and they are extremely well at what they cook/bake. In our kitchen, at home, we have an island that looks onto the kitchen and I often found myself at home doing homework there, talking to my parents, or even watching them cook in the kitchen. I became interested in cooking around when I was about 13-14 years old, especially after watching my parents cook such good food for years (attention), this is where my motivation came in (desire to cook). Overtime I would ask my mom to further explain what it was that she was doing or I would watch videos on youtube and facebook of people cooking, which is for sure when the mirror neurons became most active in order for my memory to come into effect. After I watched both my parents cook numerous dishes and desserts, I became confident enough to try it on my own. Of course, there was trial and error, and not every dish came out perfect the first time, but I was able to do it (imitation) and eventually able to perfect it. The key out of the four elements to me is motivation, you need the motivation to want to learn how to do something, you need it to understand that you will fail at a task sometimes, and you need it to keep on going so you can eventually know exactly how to perform a task on your own. Observational learning can be applied to so many other situations in a person’s life and can be key to how someone learns something.
This is an amazing breakdown of observational leaning and a perfect example to how this works. Many people find it difficult to relate topics to one another and I believe that is something you did so well at here. I really liked how you spent the time to tie in many different parts of observational learning and used it to show the process you went through when learning to make food. One specific part that stuck out to me was the usage of mirror neurons and when you described how your brain knew many of the steps just from watching. Another part of the blog I believe you did an excellent job in showing is that although you used all of the processes to learn, (imitation, attention, desire, and memory) you showed that some may have influenced you more than others. The final few lines of this post were my favorite part about it because even though you used a specific example from your childhood you made it relatable to everyone in the class.