You learn part of your self-identity and ascribed social roles by observing the way those roles are represented in society. Your self-identity and social role influences your behavior. When you develop a self-identity from observed roles that is different from your self-realized identity, the result can be psychological problems. For instance, if a girl grows up in a region where women hold a lower social role from men, she can develop a self-identity that believes this stereotype. If the girl believes that this identity is not right for her, she can develop a confused sense of self-identity.
The educational process involves students observing teachers and students interacting with each other in classrooms. The educational environment is an example of the social cognition theory in practice. In the educational field, the social cognition theory explains how teachers pass information on to students. Students observe their teacher and the information becomes part of the student's understanding. Additionally, students learn about social roles by observing the social constructs that their peers form.
Words have different connotations and meanings, depending on who uses them and in what context. For instance, if you heard the word "green" used on HGTV, it may conjure up images of wallpaper, linen or carpet. If you heard same word used on the financial channel, it may conjure up images of money. Because language is so complex and versatile, you could never teach a student every possible meaning of a word. Additionally, people use non-verbal communication to convey messages to others. Social cognitive theory explains how individuals can develop these skills and understand these differences by watching how others use words.
A child learns his earliest impressions of morality by watching the decisions that his parents make and the way his friends act. Early moral development is a process of observation and later a questioning of those observations. Social cognition theory explains the foundation of morality, and how it is passed along from generation to generation.