Observational learning is the process of learning in which one learns by looking at or watching the behavior and actions of others. The person who looks at the other as a role model ensures that he watches, remembers, and then acts in a similar fashion.
Observational Learning is also called shaping and modeling and hence it is commonly found among children because they have the habit of looking at their parents and elderly people in the family and imitating their behavior and actions. In children, observational learning is not intentional and hence, can be said to be happening naturally as per the situations and circumstances.
Thus, it is advised that when children are growing up, parents should set the right example to their children and not take up or show off any wrong habits among them. The recent advertisement on television on Little’s Baby Wipes | Cleaning Kyun Mumma Ka Turn? clearly shows how inequality at household chores leads small children to think that it is always a mother’s duty to do the housework. In the advertisement, when a baby makes stuff dirty, the woman’s husband i.e. baby’s father and mother-in-law keep calling her to clean the stuff. The youngest daughter looks at these things and when the baby’s diaper needs to be changed, she calls the name of her mother Meghana unintentionally as she sees her father and grandmother doing the same in earlier times. Thus, Meghana’s husband realizes that he has set the wrong example to his daughter and takes up the responsibility of changing the diaper.
Another example can be if a child sees his or her mother and father fighting all the time on silly issues, it also takes up that habit and fights with his siblings or friends on silly matters. Thus, it is very essential that parents and elderly people in the family must take care of what they do in the house in order to ensure the observational learning happens in the right manner.