Self-efficacy determinants of anticipated fears and calamities.

This comment analyzes the issues raised by Kirsch regarding the role of self-percepts of coping efficacy in avoidance behavior. Evidence is reviewed that shows that people who perceive themselves as inefficacious in wielding control over potentially aversive events view them anxiously, conjure up possible injurious consequences, and display phobic avoidance of them. Self-efficacy theory pos-tulates an interactive, though asymmetric, relation between perceived self-efficacy and fear arousal, with self-judged efficacy exerting the greater impact. This enables people to perform activities at lower strengths of self-judged efficacy despite fear arousal and to take self-protective action without having to wait for fear arousal to prompt them to action. In a recent article, Kirsch (1982) reported that college students who say they fear snakes raise their confidence that they could hold one if offered such hypothetical incentives as money ranging up to 1 million, saving some-