Contemporary: Brendagen Flashcards
Aim
To find out to what extent is the variance of social aggression is explained by genetic, shared environmental, or non-shared environmental factors
Is there a relationship between physical and social aggression
Sample
322 twin pairs, some of whom were tested for zygosity by DNA test and others via physical resembelance.
The sample was followed longitudinally at 5, 18, 30, 48, and 60 months focusing on a variety of child and family-related characteristics. A sixth wave of data collection was completed at 6 years of age to assess children’s social adaptation in kindergarten
Method
Teachers rated the children’s level of social aggression and physical aggression with questions like ‘‘tries to make others dislike a child,’’ and ‘‘says bad things or spreads nasty rumors about another child. Responses were given on a 3-point scale (never, sometimes, often).
The children were then asked to circle the photos of three children who best fit a behavioral descriptor. Two behavioral descriptors were used for social aggression (‘‘tells others not to play with a child’’ and ‘‘tells mean secrets about another child’’) and two others for physical aggression (‘‘gets into fights’’ and ‘‘hits, bites, or kicks others’’).
Results
There is a much higher correlation (nearly double) from MZ to DZ twins on Physical aggression. This means that Physical aggression in this study was found to be down to Nature
MZ and DZ twins had similar ratings on social aggression. This means that Social aggression in this study was found to be down to Nurture
Conflict
The aggression itself may be biological but how it is shown/ may be determined by environmental factors such as how they have been shown aggression in the past.
Children seem to move from physical to social aggression as they age (possibly to avoid punishment, possibly because of developing skills)
+inter rater reliability
A main advantage of the present study is it assessed behavior not only by teachers but also by peers, who are rarely employed as a reporting source in twin studies.- Finding essentially the same thing- These two tests validate the findings of one another
+usefulness
Twin studies such as this are useful for identifying nature and nurture factors. We can apply this information to give useful applications such as identifying behaviours which are precursors to aggression which we could then address.
-generalisability
A relatively small sample size when looking at the different groups, this was however because the researchers had to sit down with every child in the nursery to look at their results. The age of the children also has a factor in lowering the generalisability.
-EVs
There could be high levels of EVs in the lives of the twins which might explain the aggression shown in the study beyond simply ‘nature or nurture’
