Aggression - Applied Social Psychology - Psychology SuperNotes

Aggression
Applied Social Psychology By M.S. Ahluwalia
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Contents
1. What is Aggression?
2. Theories of Aggression
3. Causes of Aggression
4. Management of Aggression
Aggression
Super-Notes
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Aggression: Opposite to Prosocial Behaviour
11
What
is
Aggression?
• Aggressive behaviour is viewed as one of the most disturbing forms of human
social behaviour.
• Every night on the news there are reports about murders, wars, and rapes. But
the news isn’t the only place where people encounter violent or aggressive
behaviour, humans exhibit aggressive behaviour on a regular basis. Example:
• Driving home from work, people get cut off and cussed at on a daily basis.
• At school, children fight over who will be the first in the lunch line.
• On the street, people get pushed out of the way if they are not walking fast enough.

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Human Aggression
Any behaviour directed towards another
individual that is carried out with the
proximate (immediate) intent to cause harm.
12

Aggression
13
What
is
Aggression?
• The perpetrator must believe that the behaviour will harm the target, and that
the target is motivated to avoid the behaviour (Bushman & Anderson 2001).
• Accidental harm is not aggressive because it is not intended.
• Harm that is an incidental by-product of helpful actions is also not aggressive,
because the harm-doer believes that the target is not motivated to avoid the action
(e.g., pain experienced during a dental procedure).
• Aggression is of two types:
• Hostile/Affective/Impulsive/Reactive
• Instrumental

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Hostile/Affective/Impulsive/Reactive
Aggression
Being impulsive, thoughtless (i.e., unplanned),
driven by anger, having the ultimate motive of
harming the target, and occurring as a reaction
to some perceived provocation.
14

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Instrumental Aggression
A premeditated means of obtaining some goal
other than harming the victim, and being
proactive rather than reactive.
(Berkowitz 1993, Geen 2001)
15

c
Contents
Aggression
Super-Notes
16

Domain Specific Theories of Aggression
17
Theories
of
Aggression
Aggression
1
Biological Aspects
2
Drive Theory
3
Social Learning
Theory

1. Biological Aspects: Aggression – An Intrinsic Drive
18
Theories
of
Aggression
The oldest and probably the most famous explanations for human aggression suggest that
human beings are somehow “programmed” for violence by their basic nature.
• Such theories attribute human violence to built-in (i.e. inherited) urges to aggress
against others.
• The most famous supporter of this theory was Sigmund Freud, who held that aggression
stems mainly from a powerful death wish (Thanatos) possessed by all people.
• According to Freud, this instinct is initially aimed at self-destruction…
• …but is soon redirected outward towards others.
• Konrad Lorenz, a Noble Prize-winning ethologist, proposed a related view that aggression
springs mainly from an inherited fighting instinct, which assures that only the strongest
males will obtain mates and pass their genes on to the next generation.

1. Biological Aspects: Genetic Influence
19
Theories
of
Aggression
• While most social psychologists
continue to reject the view that
human aggression stems largely
from innate factors, with the
growth of the evolutionary
perspective in psychology, some
now accept the possibility that
genetic factors play some role in
human aggression.
• The biological approach to
aggression includes the belief that
the propensity for aggressive
behaviour lies in an individual’s
genetic makeup.
Twin studies
Monozygotic twins (genetically identical) display, more similar levels of
aggressive behaviour than dizygotic twins, indicating genetic influence.
Adoption studies can help to untangle the relative contributions of
environment and heredity in aggression.
- If a positive correlation is found between aggressive behaviour in adopted
children and aggressive behaviour in their biological parents, a genetic
effect is implied.
- If a positive correlation is found between the adoptee’s aggressive behaviour
and the rearing family, then an environmental effect is implied.
A study of over 14,000 adoptions in Denmark found that a significant number
of adopted boys with criminal convictions had biological parents
(particularly fathers) with criminal convictions (Hutchings and Mednick,
1975), providing evidence for a genetic effect.

1. Biological Aspects: Neurotransmitters and Hormones
20
Theories
of
Aggression
Neurotransmitters
• Neurotransmitters are chemicals that
enable impulses within the brain to be
transmitted from one area of the brain to
another.
• There is some evidence that at least two of
these neurotransmitters, serotonin and
dopamine, are linked to aggressive
behaviour.
• Low levels of serotonin and high levels
of dopamine have been associated with
aggression in animals and humans.
Hormones
• The male sex hormone testosterone is
thought to influence aggression from
young adulthood onwards due to its
action on brain areas involved in
controlling aggression.
• Cortisol appears to have a mediating
effect on other aggression-related
hormones such as testosterone, possibly
because it increases anxiety and the
likelihood of social withdrawal.

2. Drive Theory: Frustration-Aggression Hypothesis
21
Theories
of
Aggression
Dollard & Miller (1939) proposed a theory known as frustration-aggression
hypothesis.
• Frustration leads to the arousal of a drive whose primary goal is that of harming
some person or object - primarily the perceived cause of frustration
(Berkowitz, 1989).
• The central role assigned to frustration by the frustration-aggression hypothesis
has turned out to be largely false - frustration is only one of many different
causes of aggression.

3. Social Learning Theory
22
Theories
of
Aggression
• According to social learning theories (Bandura 1983), people acquire aggressive
responses the same way they acquire other complex forms of social behaviour
- either by direct experience or by observing others.
• It explains the acquisition of aggressive behaviours, via observational learning
processes, and provides a useful set of concepts for understanding and describing
the beliefs and expectations that guide social behaviour.
• The key concepts regarding the development and change of expectations and how
one construes the social world are particularly useful in understanding the
acquisition of aggressive behaviours and in explaining instrumental aggression.

c
Contents
Aggression
Super-Notes
23

Causes of Human Aggression
24
Causes
of
Aggression
1. Personal Factors 1. Traits
2. Gender Differences
3. Beliefs
4. Attitudes
5. Values
2. Situational Factors 1. Aggressive Cues
2. Provocation
3. Frustration
4. Pain and Discomfort
5. Drugs
Next

Personal Factors
25
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
• Person factors include all the characteristics a person brings to the situation,
such as personality traits, attitudes, and genetic predispositions.
• Stable person factors: display consistency across time, across situations, or across
both.
• In a very real sense, personality is the sum of a person’s knowledge structures.
• Knowledge structures also influence what situations a person will selectively seek out
and what situations will be avoided, further contributing to trait-like consistency.
• Together, person factors comprise an individual’s preparedness to aggress.

1. Traits
26
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
Certain traits predispose individuals to high levels of aggression. The idea of an
“aggressive personality” is quite an attractive one.
• ‘Type A Personality’ is a behaviour pattern consisting primarily of high level of
competitiveness, time urgency and hostility.
• Those who exhibit this pattern of behaviour are hyperactive and very
competitive in their interactions with other people.
• They are also more aggressive towards those whom they perceive in as
competing an important task.

27
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
Males and females differ in aggressive tendencies, especially in the most violent behaviours of homicide and
aggravated assault.
• Men: much more likely to engage in physical aggression.
• Both: are equally likely to engage in verbal aggression.
Men and women experience aggression differently (Cambell & Muncer, 1987).
• Women:
• view their aggression as often coming from excessive stress and a loss of self-control.
• feel more guilt and concern after being aggressive than men.
• Men:
• often view aggressive acts as an exercise in control over others, brought on by a challenge to their self-esteem or integrity.
• are more likely to view their aggressive acts as positive (instrumental aggression).
Recently, researchers have also considered indirect aggression: gossiping, spreading false rumours, revealing
someone’s secrets without their permission. Research in Finland showed adolescent girls are much more likely to
engage in indirect aggression than teenage boys (Bjorkqvist, Lagerspatz, & Kaukainen, 1992).

3. Beliefs
28
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
Many types of beliefs play a role in preparedness to aggress.
• Efficacy related beliefs are particularly important (e.g., Bandura 1977).
• Those who believe that they can successfully carry out specific aggressive acts
(self-efficacy) and that these acts will produce the desired outcomes (outcome-
efficacy) are much more likely to select aggressive behaviours than those who
are not so confident of the efficacy of aggressive acts.

4. Attitudes
29
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
• Positive attitudes towards violence in general also prepare certain individuals
for aggression.
• More specific positive attitudes about violence against specific groups of people
also increase aggression against those people. Example:
• attitudes about violence against women are positively related to sexual aggressiveness
against women.
• Males prone to aggress against women are not generally aggressive against all people in all
situations; rather, they specifically target women (but not men) who have provoked them
(Anderson, 1996).
Attitudes
general evaluations people hold about themselves, other people, objects, and
issues.

5. Values
30
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Personal
Factors
• Values, or beliefs about what one should or ought to do, also play a role in
aggression preparedness.
• For many people, violence is a perfectly acceptable method of dealing with
interpersonal conflict, perhaps even a preferred method.

Causes of Human Aggression
31
Causes
of
Aggression
1. Personal Factors 1. Traits
3. Beliefs
4. Attitudes
5. Values
2. Situational Factors 1. Aggressive Cues
2. Provocation
3. Frustration
5. Drugs
Next

Situational Factors
32
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
• Situational factors include any important features of the situation, such as
presence of a provocation or an aggressive cue.
• Like the person factors, situational factors influence aggression by influencing:
• cognition,
• affect, and
• arousal.

1. Aggressive Cues
33
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
• Example: Berkowitz and LePage (1967) found that the mere presence of guns
(versus badminton racquets and shuttlecocks) increased the aggressive behaviour
of angered research participants.
• Other situational variables that increase aggression, such as exposure to violent
television, movies, or video games, also appear to do so via cognitive cueing
effects (Anderson & Dill, 2000; Bushman, 1998).
Aggressive
Cues
objects that prime aggression-related concepts in memory.

2. Provocation
34
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
• Perhaps the single most important cause of human aggression is interpersonal
provocation (Berkowitz, 1993; Geen, 2001).
• Provocations include:
• insults,
• slights,
• other forms of verbal aggression,
• physical aggression,
• interference with one’s attempts to attain an important goal, and so on.

3. Frustration
35
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
• Most provocations can be seen as a type of frustration in which a person has been
identified as the agent responsible for failure to attain the goal.
• Even frustrations that are fully justified have been shown to increase aggression
against the frustrating agent (e.g., Dill & Anderson, 1995) and against a person who was
not responsible for the failure to attain the goal.
• More recent work has shown that displaced aggression, wherein the target of aggression
is not the person who caused the initial frustration, is a robust phenomenon.
• Whether such frustration effects operate primarily by influencing cognitions, affect, or
arousal is unclear.
Frustration the blockage of goal attainment.

36
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
Aggression is increased by:
• Non-social aversive conditions: e.g., hot temperatures, loud noises, unpleasant
odours (Berkowitz, 1993).
• Acute aversive conditions: such as pain produced by immersing a hand in a
bucket of ice water, increase aggression.
• General discomfort: such as that produced by sitting in a hot room, can also
increase aggression; this effect appears to be mediated primarily by increasing
negative affect, though there may be cognitive and arousal processes at work
too (Anderson et al., 2000).

5. Drugs
37
Causes
of
Aggression
>>
Situational
Factors
• Various drugs such as alcohol and caffeine can also increase aggression.
• These effects appear to be indirect rather than direct.
• Bushman (1997) found that aggression-facilitating factors (e.g., provocation,
frustration, aggressive cues) have a much stronger effect on people who are
under the influence of drugs than on people who are not.

c
Contents
Aggression
Super-Notes
38

Management of Aggression
39
Management
of
Aggression
• From an evolutionary perspective, aggression can be viewed as adaptive behaviour, at least in
some situations.
• Example: competition for desirable mates is often intense, and one way to “win” in such contests is through
aggression against potential rivals.
• On the other hand, living together in human society often requires restraining aggressive
behaviour.
• Aggression is not an inevitable or unalterable form of behaviour. On the contrary, because it stems
from a complex interplay between cognition, situational factors, and personal characteristics, it
can be prevented or reduced through some useful techniques.
1
Punishment
2
Self-
Regulation
3
Positive Self-
talk
4
Forgiveness
5
Multisystemic
Therapy

1. Punishment
40
Management
of
Aggression
• In most societies throughout the world, punishment - delivery of aversive
consequences - is a major technique for reducing aggression.
• People who engage in such behaviour:
• receive large fines,
• are put in prison,
• in some countries are placed in solitary confinement or
• receive physical punishment for their aggressive actions.

2. Self-Regulation
41
Management
of
Aggression
• Lashing out at others in response to every provocation is not adaptive and can
greatly disrupt social life. For this reason, it is clear that we possess effective
internal mechanism for restraining anger and overt aggression.
• Such mechanisms are described by the term self-regulation (or self-control) and
refers to our capacity to regulate many aspects of own behaviour, including
aggression.

3. Positive Self-Talk
42
Management
of
Aggression
• Another very powerful anger management technique is to change the inner
conversation that you have with yourself (self-talk).
• It is normal for people to have an inner dialogue that can either:
• get them more worked up: e.g., “If he even looks at me the wrong way, I’m going to
explode”
• put them in a calmer frame of mind e.g., “Relax, stay calm, I can get through this”
• The words we say to ourselves are very powerful and can definitely influence how
we feel and how we subsequently behave.

4. Forgiveness
43
Management
of
Aggression
• Giving up the desire to punish someone who has hurt us and seeking, instead, to
act in kind, helpful ways toward them, may be highly beneficial in many ways,
including the reduction of subsequent aggression.

5. Multisystemic Therapy
44
Management
of
Aggression
• Multisystemic therapy is a family-based approach that first identifies the major
factors contributing to the delinquent and violent behaviours of the individual
undergoing treatment.
• Biological, school, work, peer group, family and neighbourhood factors are examined.
• Intervention is then tailored to fit the individual constellation of contributing
factors.
• Opportunities to observe and commit further violent and criminal offenses are severely
restricted, whereas prosocial behaviour opportunities are greatly enhanced and rewarded.
• Both the long-term success rate and the cost/benefit ratio of this approach
have greatly exceeded other attempts at treating violent individuals.

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