Discrepancies between self-efficacy judgment and performance will arise when either the tasks or the circumstances under which they are performed are ambiguous
Albert BanduraWhen people are not aiming for anything in particular or when they cannot monitor their performance, there is little basis for translating perceived efficacy into appropriate magnitudes of effort
Albert BanduraTo the extent that children with similar characteristics achieve comparable performance levels, using the performances of similar peers is likely to yield more accurate self-appraisal than using the accomplishments of dissimilar peers
Albert BanduraIt is no more informative to speak of self-efficacy in global terms than to speak of nonspecific social behavior
Albert BanduraPeople behave agentically, but they produce theories that afford people very little agency.
Albert BanduraFor many activities, people cannot rely solely on themselves in evaluating their ability level because such judgments require inferences from probabilistic indicants of talent about which they may have limited knowledge. Self-appraisals are, therefore, partly based on the opinions of others who presumably possess evaluative competence
Albert Bandura