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Self-efficacy matters because it predicts whether someone actually attempts a task, not just whether they have the skill to do it. Self-efficacy is a person's belief in their own ability to succeed at a specific task, proposed by Albert Bandura within social cognitive theory (a framework where behaviour, personal factors, and environment continually influence each other). For example, imagine two patients with the same knowledge of a diet plan: the one who believes she can stick to it is far more likely to try, and to keep going after a lapse. In practice, low self-efficacy for a specific task can stop someone acting even when they have the ability and the motivation.

Bandura described four sources of self-efficacy, ranked by strength. The strongest is mastery experience, succeeding at the task yourself; next is vicarious experience, watching someone similar succeed; then verbal persuasion, encouragement from others; and finally physiological state, how anxious or calm the body feels while doing it. For example, imagine a patient with needle phobia who successfully has one blood test: that direct mastery experience raises her confidence for the next test more than any amount of reassurance from staff. In practice, this means clinicians build self-efficacy fastest by arranging a small achievable success, not by verbal encouragement alone. Self-efficacy is task-specific, so believing you can quit smoking says little about your self-efficacy for exercising regularly.

• Bandura described four sources of self-efficacy. Which source involves being told convincingly by a trusted other that one is capable of the task?
• Which of Bandura's four sources of self-efficacy is generally regarded as the most powerful?
• Bandura's earlier work demonstrated that children imitated aggressive behaviour they had watched an adult perform toward an inflatable doll. What is this study called?
• Bandura proposed that person, environment and behaviour each influence one another in a continuous loop. What term did he give this principle?

• Self-esteem, a global sense of self-worth, unlike self-efficacy's task-specific confidence.
• Locus of control, belief about who controls outcomes (internal vs external), whereas self-efficacy is about competence at a specific task.
• Outcome expectancy, belief that an action will produce a given result, rather than self-efficacy's belief that you personally can perform the action.
• Theory of planned behaviour's perceived behavioural control: overlaps with self-efficacy but sits within a broader model predicting intention, unlike Bandura's standalone construct.

• That overlaps the arousal source rather than being separate.
• Written information is not one of the four recognised sources.
• That source comes from succeeding at the task oneself.
• That source comes from watching a similar person succeed.
• That source concerns how bodily sensations are interpreted.

• Name the learning, social or research principle being tested before reading the options.
• Identify the antecedent, behaviour, consequence or cognitive process in the vignette.
• Compare the direction of effect with the nearest competing principle.
• Apply the same rule to a new example to confirm that the answer transfers.