Albert Bandura’s Social Learning Theory (SLT), which was later named Social Cognitive Theory  (SCT), is being mapped empirically and theoretically in this scoping review to find its usefulness and its limitations in as far as understanding academic performance and school-related learning among African children and adolescents in rural and resource-constrained settings is concerned. This review followed Arksey and O’Malley’s framework and PRISMA-ScR reporting guidance, to review 12 sources which are charted. The evidence spans across Ethiopia, Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Zambia and Nigeria, alongside other regional and pan-African sources. The mapped literature empirically supports constructs such as self-efficacy social-cognition and modelling as powerful drivers for improving academic performance but rural-specific implementation, culturally adapted interventions, and SLT/SCT-informed school social work  in Africa remains limited. Structural constraints such as teacher shortages, inadequate learning resources, poverty and digital exclusion often restrict the environmental conditions through which observational learning and mastery experiences operate. Ubuntu-informed scholarship further raises questions about transferring an individual-level conception of efficacy into communal educational contexts. The review therefore identifies Bandura’s framework as potentially useful but context-dependent, with a substantial need for rural, culturally responsive and intervention-focused research.

Keywords: Social Learning Theory, self-efficacy, rural Africa, academic performance, Ubuntu, school social work, scoping review.