What is Self Efficacy?

Self efficacy is a self evaluation of whether a person feels they can accomplish a certain task or not. Even though self efficacy is a concept that is important for all ages, this discussion focuses on self efficacy in children. This discussion covers the history of self efficacy, self efficacy vs. self esteem, it's affect on children, and four main factors.

Albert Bandura, a theorist at Stanford University, wrote an article in 1997 addressing the topic of self efficacy. He stated that self efficacy is people's beliefs about their capabilities to produce designated levels of performance for assigned tasks. The outcome of this, exercises influence over events that affect individual's lives.

Self efficacy determines how people think, feel, behave and motivate themselves. There are several differences however, between self efficacy and self esteem. Self efficacy is the evaluation of whether one can accomplish a task or not, a judgment of confidence. Examples may include: a child asking themselves if they can do a math problem, or get a good grade in a certain class. Self esteem on the other hand, is a global evaluation of one's self worth, a judgment of self worth. (i.e., Do I like myself?)

Self efficacy not only affects children's level of confidence and how they feel about themselves, but also choices children make, as well as effort that is put out with specific tasks (e.g., how long a child will study.) Self efficacy also affects how long a child will continue trying when they run into challenges. If they fail a class how long will they keep trying? Will they give up or not? Self efficacy is a partial answer to those questions.