Freedom [should not be] conceived negatively as exemption from social influences or situational constraints. Rather...positively as the exercise of self-influence to bring about desired results.

In order to succeed, people need a sense of self-efficacy, to struggle together with resilience to meet the inevitable obstacles and inequities of life.

When actions are followed by events that are not causally related to the prior acts, people often erroneously perceive contingencies that do not, in fact, exist

Psychology cannot tell people how they ought to live their lives. It can however, provide them with the means for effecting personal and social change.

Perceived self-efficacy and beliefs about the locus of outcome causality must be distinguished

A problem of future research is to clarify how young children learn what type of social comparative information is most useful for efficacy evaluation

Self-appraisals are influenced by evaluative reactions of others.