Self-efficacy expectancies, response-outcome expectancies, emotionally, based expectancies, and their relationship to avoidant behavior and its reduction through therapy

Abstract

Investigated the relationship of four types of expectancy to snake avoidant behavior and its reduction through modeling. Response-outcome expectancies are beliefs about the consequences of a behavior; self-efficacy expectancies are beliefs about one's ability to perform the behavior. Intellectually based expectancies are views of oneself or the world that are perceived to be accurate representations of reality; emotionally based expectancies are views of oneself or the world that may be perceived as inaccurate or irrational by the person who holds them. Experiments I and II investigated the relationship of intellectually and emotionally based versions of both response-outcome expectancies and self-efficacy expectancies to snake avoidant behavior. It was found that all four expectancy variables correlate significantly with behavior on a snake avoidance task. Self-efficacy expectancies are not clearly better predictors of behavior than are response-outcome expectancies. Experiment III found that all four variables are changed as a consequence of modeling. It was concluded that a four-variable expectancy model is necessary to explain avoidant behavior.