Self efficacious children tend to attribute their successes to ability, but ability attributions affect performance indirectly through perceived self-efficacy

Such self-referent misgivings creates stress and undermine effective use of the competencies people possess by diverting attention from how best to proceed to concern over personal failings and possible mishaps

Success and failure are largely self-defined in terms of personal standards. The higher the self-standards, the more likely will given attainments be viewed as failures, regardless of what others might think.

People not only gain understanding through reflection, they evaluate and alter their own thinking.

Comparative appraisals of efficacy require not only evaluation of one;s own performances but also knowledge of how others do, cognizance of nonability determinants of their performances, and some understanding that it is others, like oneself, who provide the most informative social criterion for comparison

Gaining insight into one's underlying motives, it seems, is more like a belief conversion than a self-discovery process

People who believe they have the power to exercise some measure of control over their lives are healthier, more effective and more successful than those who lack faith in their ability to effect changes in their lives.