Chapter 9: What is Aggression Flashcards
What is Aggression?
- “Physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt someone”
- Can be social or physical
Cyberbullying
Harassing or threatening someone using e-communication
Physical Aggression
Hurting someone else’s body
Social Aggression
Hurting someone’s feelings or threatening their relationships
Hostile Aggression
- Aggression driven by anger and performed as an end in itself
- ex. Most murders
Instrumental Aggression
- Aggression that is meant to some end
- Most wars or terrorist acts
Theories of Aggression: Instinct Theory
- Freud speculated that human aggression comes from a self-destructive impulse or “death urge”
- Lorenz saw aggression as adaptive behavior
- Bofadeez saw aggression as involving instinctive behaviour
Instinctive Behavior
An innate, unlearned behaviour pattern exhibited by all members of a species
Aggression as Social Behavior
- Calling aggression an instinct explains the behavior without looking at the context
- Instinct Theory fails to account for the various forms of aggression
- Even though aggression is biologically influenced, this doesn’t mean it’s instinctual
Aggression as Evolution
- Purposeful aggression improved the odds of survival and reproduction
- Mating-related aggression: men primed to think about sex were louder toward men who provoked them
- Selfish gene-theory: men are more likely to abuse step-children than biological children
Aggression: Neural Influences
- Certain neural systems in animals and humans facilitate aggression
- These brain systems can be manipulated to increase or decrease aggression
Aggression: Genetic Influences
- Heredity influences the neural system’s sensitivity to aggressive cues
Aggression: Biochemical Influences
- Alcohol: Experiments and police data indicate that alcohol unleashes aggression when provoked
- Reduced self-awareness by focusing attention on provocations (bump in crowd)
Aggression: Frustration-Aggression Theory
- Posits that frustration triggers a readiness to aggress
Frustration
- The blocking of goal-directed behaviour
- All sports with offence-defence involve a frustrating event
Frustration-Aggression Theory: Displacement
- The redirection of aggression to a target other than the source of the frustration
- Usually, the target is a safer or more socially acceptable target
Frustration-Aggression Theory Revised
- Irritation leads to frustration, but not anger (Unjustified frustration)
- Frustration (when annoyance continues) builds to produce anger
- Aggressive cues: What are the social cues that allow me to be aggressive in this context
- Revision allows for the theory to be context-dependent
Frustration-Aggression Theory Revised: Reasoning
- Since we use reasoning to assess the context, aggression cannot be considered to “takeover” our mind
Aggression: Relative Deprivation
The perception that one is less well off when compared to others
Aggression: Learned Social Behavior
- The rewards of aggression
- We learn to aggress when rewarded
Aggression: Observational Learning
- Social Learning Theory: We learn social behavior by observing and imitating and being rewarded and punished
- Family provides model behavior
- Culture shows what is appropriate and what is not
Social Learning View of Aggression
- Aversive experiences lead to emotional arousal
- Rewards and costs lead to anticipated consequences
- These combine to form a judgement
Influences on Aggression: Aversive Incidents
Aggression often comes from aversive incidents
- Pain
- Uncomfortable heat
- An attack
Influences on Aggression: Pain
- Many species attacked whatever was around them when experiencing pain
- Frustration (not being fed when expected) also provoked aggressive behavior
- Berkowitz showed that when experiencing slight pain, participants were more willing to harm others (pain rather than frustration as provocation)
Influences on Aggression: Heat
- Climate variations (smell, smoke) are linked with aggressive behavior - the most investigated is heat
- Experiments showed that aggressiveness was increased when uncomfortable heat was present
- Real-world statistics show that hot weather leads to increased aggression
Influences on Aggression: Attacks
Being attacked (insulted, threatened, physical) is conducive to aggression, especially when perceived as intentional
Influences on Aggression: Arousal
- Arousal can lead to extreme feelings that override bodily and mental control
- Arousal can be positive or negative
- Energy levels can make situations more extreme in either positive or negative directions
- Energy levels are the same, but context-dependent (hockey game, burglary)
Elements of Hostile Aggression
- Aversive situation (pain, frustration, attack, crowding)
- Leads to; hostile thoughts, angry feelings, and arousal
- These all contribute to an aggressive reaction
Aggression Cues
- Social cues
- Context cues
- We are more likely to be aggressive when a weapon is present
Media: Porn or Sexual Violence
- Distorted perceptions of sexual reality
- Aggression against women
- Media awareness education
Media: TV and Internet
- One type of arousal energizes other behaviors (more aggressive due to misplaced arousal)
- Viewing violence disinhibits our appetite for destruction (more normal)
- Media portrayals evoke imitation
Television Affects Behavior
TV watching correlated with later criminal conviction ratings
Media: Effects on Thinking
- Desensitization (army program)
- Social Scripts (Media creates ways we’re “supposed to behave”)
- Altered perceptions (Changes in thought patterns)
- Cognitive priming (Primes to see something that may not be happening)
Media: Altering Perceptions
- The different influences of media combine to shape and shift our reality
- Desensitization can combine with social scripts to make us numb to the actions we are doing
Media: Video Games
- Identify with violent characters
- Actively rehearsing violence
- Engage in the whole sequence of enacting violence
- Engage with continual violence and threats of attack
- Repeat violent behaviours over and over
- Get rewards for violent acts
Effects of Video Games
Repeated Violent game-playing leads to:
- Aggressive beliefs and attitudes
- Aggressive perceptions
- Aggressive expectations
- Aggressive behaviour scripts
- Aggressive desensitization
These all contribute to increased aggressive personality
Media & Aggression: Prosocial Behavior
Since aggressive behaviour on TV can be imitated, so can good behaviours
