7. Same sex aggression- female aggression

Question 1

do females commit violent acts?

Answer 1

YES

In the United States, girls account for 33% of arrests for simple assault and 24% of aggravated assaults (Girls Study Group. 2008)
Surveys indicate that in the previous year, 40.5% of boys and 25.1% of girls had been in a physical fight. In the previous month, 60% of girls had called another girl names, 50% had sworn at them and 35% had pushed or shoved them [Artz at al., 2008].

Question 2

what is a comparison between male and female aggression?

Answer 2

Like boys girls are most likely to engage in same sex aggression.

Question 3

where is female aggression more prevalent?

Answer 3

Female aggression is more prevalent in disorganized neighbourhoods with high levels of poverty and low social cohesion (Ness, 2004)

Question 4

in neighbourhoods where female aggression is seen what is thought about femininity?

Answer 4

The strength and resilience of women (both mothers and daughters) is not seen as incongruent with femininity: indeed passivity is viewed as a weakness rather than an asset. As Irwin & Adler [2012] noted, ‘Given the emphasis on female strength, girls lost respect for and even targeted other girls who fell short in fulfilling idealized notions of feminine resilience circulating in the local communities’

Question 5

what is a key cause of female aggression?

Answer 5

Romantic rivalry is one cause. Girls understand their own value in terms of the quality of boys they can attract: ‘Say one guy is good looking, we’re all in a fight over who’s getting who … If all the girls are fighting for this one really popular guy and one girl gets him, everyone will think she’s more popular too’ (Atrz, 2005)
. Once a boyfriend is secured, the relationship must be protected from takeover by other girls: jealousy is another major cause of female fights. When a girl spends too much time with another girl’s boyfriend, the anger is firmly targeted at the female interloper rather than at the male partner (Artz, 2005)
Commentators have noted that jealousy-motivated fights may not be entirely about the boy but about the kudos that a relationship with a high-status boy can bring [Artz, 2005]

Question 6

what is perhaps the strongest evidence that boys lie at the heart of female competition?

Answer 6

is the terms used to insult others. The same epithets appear frequently in accounts of girls’ fights: ‘slag’, ‘slut’, ‘whore (ho)’ and ‘tart’. The second most common insults are about a girls’ appearance (‘ugly’, ‘fat’). (Artz, 2005)

They argue that girls come to view themselves through the ‘male gaze’, evaluating their worth in terms of boys’ approval and respect. But this obscures a more fundamental issue: why is male approval so important to teenage girls? Why are terms that impugn their sexual reputation so effective at triggering fights? An evolutionary approach goes beyond chastizing girls for their ‘false consciousness’.

Question 7

why is it wrong to suggest that from an evolutionary perspective human males should be more violent than females?

Answer 7

Male aggression (and the paucity of female aggression) has been explained in terms of the greater male variance in reproductive success contingent on polygyny [Daly M, Wilson M. 1988, homicide)
BUT

developments in evolutionary biology have queried the simplicity of the traditional view of sexual selection which highlights intense male (but not female) competition for mates (Eastwick PW. 2009)
Rates of female competition are higher in species (like our own) with biparental care and diminished sexual dimorphism. (Campbell, 2013)

Question 8

how is humans long history of bi-parental care mirrored?

Answer 8

The long history of human biparental care is mirrored in the fact that the vast majority of the world’s population live monogamously, despite the large number of societies that permit polygyny.

Question 9

how have consequences of bi-parental care been underrated for women?

Answer 9

The consequences of monogamy for women have been underappreciated. When a man commits himself to a single woman, his criteria for mate choice shift dramatically upwards. Monogamy entails two-way sexual selection:

Question 10

male and female mate choice differences

Answer 10

While men and women share a preference for mates who are intelligent and kind, there are some traits that assume a higher priority for one sex than the other [Buss 1989]. Women value resources, ambition and generosity which reflect their need for material and emotional support in raising children. Men value youth, attractiveness and fidelity which reflect preference for high reproductive value and the avoidance of cuckoldry.

Question 11

based on male and female differences in what is deemed attractive what will females advertising to males look like?

Answer 11

When women compete for well-resourced men, their intersexual competition will entail advertising those qualities that men value and their intrasexual competition will entail discrediting such traits in their rivals. When viewed from this perspective, girls’ preoccupation with enhancing their appearance and defending their sexual reputation becomes more comprehensible, as does the provocative power of accusations of sexual availability and ugliness.

Question 12

what factors can moderate female aggression?

Answer 12

Campbell 2013 suggests three things

1) Age
2) Sex ratio
3) Variance in male resources

Question 13

talk about age and female aggression?

Answer 13

For both sexes, the teenage years signal entry into the mating arena and a concomitant increase in aggression that is visible in criminal statistics. In line with girls’ earlier sexual maturity, their offending peak occurs 2 years earlier than boys, and menarche is aligned with aggression (Campbell, 1995)

Question 14

talk about sex ratio and female aggression

Answer 14

At the age of 25, men are three times more likely to die from all causes than women and this rises to a four times greater mortality rate for deaths from external causes. This effect is conditioned by social class and educational achievement so that in povertylevel neighbourhoods, the sex ratio imbalance is especially marked. In addition to mortality, imprisonment also removes a substantial portion of men from the mate pool (Campbell, 2013)

Question 15

talk about variance in male resources and female aggression in lower class communities

Answer 15

Huge variance in lower class communities- those who are ambitious often move away, those with jobs are rare so often get divide between those with no job and those engaging in criminal activity.  more to fight for in terms of less viable men 
Young women in these neighbourhoods compete for access to men who can supply lavish (if short-lived) resources

Taylor, 1993- ‘Dope guys is straight if they think you ain’t dissing them … I date whoever is treating your girl the right way. Me, if a guy got some paper well, it’s okay with me. I like fellas that’s rolling, least they making it’

Question 16

talk about name calling and sexual promiscuity in women

Answer 16

Because sex is a resource that men want and women can supply, women gain by maintaining a high ‘market price’ for sex. By making sex contingent on commitment, women encourage men to pursue a more monogamous strategy. Women who dispense sex too cheaply reduce the bargaining power of other women. In underclass neighbourhoods, the intense competition and the paucity of men who are willing to commit increases the temptation to offer sex at a low level of male investment. The term ‘whore’ is used not only to tarnish a rival in men’s eyes but also to mark her out as someone who has selfishly sold other women out.

Question 17

what should we not forget about about female aggression compared to male

Answer 17

Close description of the ecological setting, culture and dynamics of young women’s fighting is illuminating, but it should not distract us from the fact that, everywhere and at every historical period, physical aggression between women is less frequent and less severe than between young men
Males commit much more violent acts than females

Question 18

male and female aggression differences in primate species

Answer 18

In other primate species also, aggression between males is more injurious than between females [Smuts, 1987)

Question 19

why very generally are females less violent

Answer 19

more to lose from violence cant be afforded in terms of childcare

Question 20

what is disproportionately borne by females?

Answer 20

• for both sexes, RS is measured in the number of offspring who survive to adulthood and who themselves reproduce
• Given that maternal investment exceeds paternal investment, this burden is disproportionately borne by females.

Question 21

what do mothers do following gestation

Answer 21

• Following gestation, mothers expend calories in lactation and in feeding young children who must also be monitored and defended from natural accidents and attack by conspecifics.

Question 22

why is in surprising a bit in childcare that mothers don’t display violence?

Answer 22

• The advantages that high rank could confer in accomplishing these tasks make it all the more surprising that females do not engage in dominance contests to the same extent as males. In many species, dominant females have priority of access to food, supplant others from feeding sites and are less subjected to predation. They can suppress reproduction in subordinates, have shorter interbirth intervals and produce more surviving offspring [Stockley et al., 2011].
• The advantages of dominance combined with the reluctance of females to risk aggression in its pursuit suggest that there must be associated costs.

Question 23

so why aren’t women violet in terms of risk

Answer 23

• Aggression involves the possibility of injury and death and their consequences on reproductive success are not equal for men and women. For women, with their limited variance in fecundity, child survival plays a critical role in their ultimate reproductive success.

Question 24

evidence for risk of mother death

Answer 24

• Pavard et al. [2005] conducted a careful study of births in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Quebec. They excluded cases in which the baby died immediately following birth (to exclude obstetric complications and cross-infection) and corrected for between-family heterogeneity (intrinsic family mortality levels). A mother’s death during the neonatal period increased the odds of her child dying in the postnatal period (28– 299 days) by 5.52. Although the effect was less extreme at later ages, the death of a mother in early childhood (3 –5 years) increased the odds of her child dying in the same period by approx. 2.5 and by approx. 1.5 if her death occurred during late childhood (5 –15 years).

Question 25

study on effect of maternal versus paternal death

Answer 25

• A contrast with the effect of paternal death is instructive. In every study in which there was a direct comparison of the effect of maternal and paternal deaths, the loss of a father had substantially less impact [Sear and Mace, 2008]. Indeed in 15 out of 22 (68%) studies, the presence of a father had no impact at all on child survival.

Question 26

what may mediate a lack of aggression in females?

Answer 26

• A woman’s reproductive success may have depended on the avoidance of risky behaviours, including aggression

Question 27

what can aggression be conceived as a trade off between?

Answer 27

• Aggression can be conceived of as a trade-off between anger (approach) and fear (avoidance) which suggests that alterations in the intensity of these fundamental affective responses may underlie willingness to aggress.

Question 28

evidence that it is not women being less angry

Answer 28

• The possibility that women’s lower level of anger might explain their greater desistance is not supported by research. Meta-analyses indicate no sex difference in anger either in adults [37] or in children (Hyde et al., 2006].

Question 29

evidence that women are more risk averse

Answer 29

• Yet, there is ample evidence that women are more risk averse than men [Byrnes et al., 1999)
• Women and girls show more corrugator muscle and electrodermal activity than men when viewing negative images and a stronger startle response to a noise blast delivered during exposure to fear-inducing pictures [Bradley et al., 1999)
• Cross culturally women are more prone to phobic fears and anxiety (McLean and Anderson, 2009)

Question 30

what to talk about in terms of fear in women

Answer 30

generally more anxious and then

neuropsychology of fear (amygdala)

Question 31

what is the amygdala thought to be associated with

Answer 31

For many years, it was believed that the amygdala was uniquely associated with fear responses, although it is now thought to register other strong or salient stimuli.

Question 32

what have meta-analyses shown about women and the amygdala

Answer 32

Meta-analyses conclude that women do show greater activation to threat in the limbic system, especially the amygdala (Whittle et al., 2011)

Question 33

amygdala greater extent in women study

Answer 33

In one study, women showed a greater extent (rather than magnitude) of activation together with a more extended time course: during exposure to threatening stimuli, women exhibited sustained amygdala activation (and skin conductance), whereas men’s response diminished more quickly [Williams et al., 2005]

Question 34

male and female activity to angry and fearful faces

Answer 34

McClure et al. [2004] compared men’s and women’s reactivity to angry and fearful faces. The relative engagement of the amygdala bilaterally to angry faces was greater in women suggesting that women react more fearfully than men to unambiguously threatening (angry) faces.

Question 35

what does supporting evidence for women’s fear for aggression come from

Answer 35

the way that women are more likely to attack one another

Question 36

what form of aggression do women use

Answer 36

veGossip can be an effective low-cost aggressive tactic, particularly within the realm of mate competition, when searching for and courting a mate, driving off rivals and attempting to retain valued relationship partners, thus gossip has been argued to be the weapon of choice among women to indirectly aggress against same-sex competitors (Campbell, 2004)rbal aggression-

Question 37

what form of gossip do women use?

Answer 37

Not gossip of the social an informational kind but instead reputation gossip, content relationg to a particular persons reputation- influencing the collection of beliefs and opinions generally held about them by others.

Question 38

women use more socially manipulative tactics for aggression study

Answer 38

Across a variety of diverse cultures French et al., (2002) found that girls and women show a bias towards more hidden and socially manipulative aggressive tactics in favour of physical aggression.

Question 39

women + likely to gossip evidence

Answer 39

Has also been found that women are more prone to gossip than men (Davis et al., 2018) and that women are more likely to use gossip in an aggressive or socially destructive way (McAndrew, 2014)
Women further demonstrate a stronger desire to hear gossip about a member of their own sex and are more likely to gossip about same-sex friends and relatives in comparison to men (McAndrew et al., 2002)

Question 40

conclusion on female agression

Answer 40

From an evolutionary viewpoint, variance between women in reproductive outcomes tells us that women are in competition.

The extent to which that competition takes the form of aggressive confrontation varies as a function of ecological pressure.

The challenge for psychology is to identify the psychological and neural mechanisms that underpin its expression and form, and that restrict its severity relative to men’s.