Fiona White Flashcards
WHO (World Health Organisation) Aggression Statistics
Each year, nearly 1.4 million people worldwide lose their lives to violence.
Barling, et al. 2009
Defining Aggression
It is reasonably well established in the literature that when aggression becomes more physical in nature (assault, murder etc) it is referred to as violence
By definition, all violent behaviours are aggressive whereas not all aggressive behaviours are violent
Behaviour initiated that is intended to physically and/or psychologically harm another individual and that the target is motivated to avoid
Behaviour directed towards the goal of harming another living being who is motivated to avoid such treatment (Baron & Byrne, 2003, p.435)
Sub-types of aggression (Brengen et al. 2008)
i) direct physical aggression (bullying, hitting, kicking and/or punching)
ii) direct verbal aggression (such as name calling), and
iii) indirect or relational aggression (such as gossiping, social exclusion and ostracism).
- Indirect aggression is as harmful as physical aggression
Bandura’s (1973; 1987) Social Cognitive (Learning) Model
where aggressive behaviors are modeled from others’ behaviours via vicarious or observational learning.
Theories of aggression
Crick and Dodge’s (1994) Social Information Processing Model and Huesmann’s (1998) Script Model
Developmental models of antisocial and aggressive behavior. Children acquire aggressive cognition and aggressive internalised scripts through early experiences and socialization.
Theories of aggression
Anderson and Bushman’s (2002) General Aggression Model (GAM)
The GAM is the only social–cognitive model that explicitly incorporates biological, personality, social processes, basic cognitive processes (e.g., perception, priming), short-term and long-term processes, and decision processes into understanding aggression.
Theories of aggression
When dealing with multi-causal phenomenon such as aggression, with several interacting risk factors, the development of effective reduction strategies will be a considerable challenge. The first step is to target these known risk factors.
Biological Risk Factors of Aggression
Genes and brain structures
One gene is the monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) gene. The enzyme that the MAOA gene codes for breaks down serotonin, a neurotransmitter that is low in antisocial individuals.
Males with a common polymorphism (variant) in the MAOA gene have an 8% reduction in the volume of the amygdala, anterior cingulate, and prefrontal cortex (Meyer-Lindenberg et al., 2006) - brain structures involved in emotion and found to be compromised in antisocial individuals.
Personality Risk Factors of Aggression: Bettencourt et al. (2006)
Individuals who were high in trait aggressiveness and trait irritability behaved more aggressively than those who were low in trait aggressiveness under both neutral and provoking conditions.
Persons who score high on trait aggressiveness/irritability direct greater levels of aggressive behavior toward others even when situations are relatively neutral may suggest that they have the capacity to engage in a cold-blooded style of aggressive behavior.
Situational Risk Factors of Aggression
- Konijin, Bijvank, & Bushman (2007)
Aggression was operationalised was loud noise, aggressive people identified with the aggressor more fully and they way they administered the noise was such a level it made permanent damage. Suggests games provoke aggression.
Have shown that wishfully identifying with violent characters in the virtual world can influence adolescents to behave more aggressively against others in the real world
Anderson et al. (2010)
Meta-analysis on the effects of violent video games on aggressive behavior included 130 studies, 380 effect sizes and N = 130, 296.
Exposure to violent video games is a causal risk factor for increased aggressive behaviour, aggressive cognition, and aggressive affect and for decreased empathy and prosocial behaviour.
For experimental studies, r+ = .210. For cross-sectional studies the best raw and best partials analyses yielded average effect sizes of r+ = .262 and .171, respectively. For longitudinal studies the best raw and best partials analyses yielded average effect sizes of r + = .203 and .075, respectively
Biological Aggression Reduction Strategies
Despite making significant neuro-scientific advances we still do not yet know how to directly reverse genetic predispositions to antisocial behaviour;
Although we know that the neuro-circuitry implicated in the regulation of aggression is closely related to the circuitry involved in fear conditioning and affective control –a more elaborated delineation between these regions is still needed (Siever, 2008).
It is also clear that serotonin modulates prefrontal activity, but greater regional specificity is still required
Needs medication more than other interventions, medication such as prozac which helps numerous things not just aggression and violence. Specificity needs work.
Raine: Looked at criminals, the brains of clinical sample very different from a non-clinical sample. Looked at 41 murderers, had poorer prefrontal cortex to do with inhibition.
Over a 12 year period a man killed 64 people, showed good frontal brain functioning. Like smoking/ cancer, not one size fits all.
Self-control or self-regulatory training Aggression Reduction Strategies
strategies are available for individuals with high levels of trait aggressiveness (see Bettencourt et al. (2006)’s meta-analysis)
Research by Denson and colleagues (2011) has shown that self-control training (SCT) over a 2-week period can decrease anger and aggression in response to provocation
Denson et al. (2011)
Design of Denson et al. study (2011):
i) Pre-test measures
ii) SCT for 2 weeks or control condition. Taught people how to self-control over a 2-week period in response to provocation. 70 part., 35 in SCT and 35 in control. SCT group reuire to use non-dominant hand between 8am and 6pm for two weeks. Had to use a computer mouse, stir tea etc. Had to exert effort- effortful self-control required, asked to exert as much effort as possible.Were also required to fill in an effort online diary every second day and got a self-report 1-10 measure of how much effort they were putting in.
iii) Provocation – negative feedback. Got participants to give a speech and gave negative feedback to every speech
iv) Retaliation via white noise blast using Taylor Paradigm (1967)- measured aggression by how long and loud the blast was
v) Post-test measures
Results: SCT reduced aggression among individuals high in trait aggression. Participants who received the training also reported less anger than controls. Undergrad students. not clinically tested in the real world yet.
Greitmeyer et al., (2012)
Tested if the same basic social cognitive processes activated when playing aggressive videogames should yield prosocial effects when video game content is primarily prosocial.
i) 60 German students had provocation with negative feedback
ii) played either prosocial game ‘fire-fighters’, neutral game ‘ping-pong’ or violent VG, ‘mortal combat’ for 15 mins
iii) completed arousal and mood scales
iv) retaliation via white noise blast
Results: Prosocial gamers behaved less aggressively than the neutral gamers. Difference in white noise retaliation but no difference in arousal. Importantly, participants playing prosocial game were not primed to use less aggression but were primed to use prosocial behaviour. This acts as an antagonist of aggressive responses. They may have a new script to retrieve when administering white noise. This is a short-term study.
Granic, Lobel & Engels’ (2014) recent review
Benefits of playing video games
i) Cognitive – Shooter games (Grand Theft Auto etc) improve spatial skills; and more accurate attention allocation.
“…the research on the negative impact of these games needs to be balanced with evidence for the cognitive benefits….” (p. 70).
ii) Motivational - Certain types of games will foster healthy motivational styles (persistence in the face of failure), while others may not.
iii) Social – some video games (World of Warcraft) promote social skills such as cooperation, support, and helping behaviors.
“…The games people choose to play, in turn, exert diverse influences on players’ motivations, emotional states, and social interactions….” (p.74).
Goldstein (1999) Negative effects of media violence
1) Aggression effect:Increased copycat and/or self-directed behaviour
2) Victim effect: Increased fearfulness, mistrust and self-protectiveness
3) Bystander effect: Increased desensitisation and callousness
Goldstein (1999) Parental strategies for reducing aggression
- Watch a few children’s shows yourself. Be your child.
- Plan viewing in advance. Emphasise non-violent shows
- Monitor child’s actual viewing. Explain undesirability of initiating violence.
- Watch some shows with your child. Contrast real and pretend.
- Provide interesting alternative activities, reading.
- Explain false or exaggerated commercial claims.
- Encourage legislation, television organisations and advertisers to increase non-violent video programming/
Boxer and colleagues (2006) School-based education strategies for reducing aggression
there are over 200 documented evaluations of programs to prevent aggression. Some of the consistent meta-analytic findings include:
i) programs delivered by teachers are more effective than those delivered by research staff;
ii) programs targeting primary school were more effective than those targeting high schools;
iii) programs intervening in the whole school environment were more effective than those targeting the classroom solely.
Boxer and Dubow (2002)
Social-cognitive programming has been identified as a ‘best practice’ for school-based programs, for example, improved social problem-solving or reframing of hostile attributions are processes that have been emphasised.
Programs need 4 steps:
- Cue attention and interpretation;
- Script search and retrieval; should have prosocial scripts through role playing and prosocial videos so they have another alternative to retrieve if provoked
- Script interpretation
- Evaluation of enviromental response, need to evaluate the responses of everyone around them as well to see if its effective.
research shows that aggression follows a reliable pathway from initial onset of minor aggression (teasing, being mean, hitting someone to hurt), to physical fighting (getting involved in physical fights), and finally to violence (physically attacking people, using weapons etc).
Tolan et al. (2000) found that among violent males youths aged 15 years of age, 94% had progressed through this pathway.
Nixon and Werner (2010) School-based education strategies
recently evaluated the Creating a Safe School (CASS) program amongst 405 sixth grade students. Over 10-12 classroom sessions:
a) raising awareness and increasing knowledge of relational aggression (RA)
b) building empathy
c) challenging beliefs endorsing or tolerating RA
Results: The CASS intervention was only effective for students who were high in RA at pre-test. Floor levels of aggression can’t be reduced no matter how long the program goes for. Need to break aggressive behavior early.
School-based education strategies
The Vienna Social Competence training program is 13-week classroom based program that focuses on increasing the salience and cognitive accessibility of ‘socially competent’, non-aggressive behavioural response options in conflict situations.
Gollwitzer, Banse, Eisenbach and Naumann’s (2007) evaluation found no short-term (pre-test vs post-test – 13 weeks later) differences in aggression between the control and training classes, however, between post-test and follow-up (4mths later) an increase in aggressiveness was observed among the control classes, but not among the trained classes.
Gender pay gap
In November 2015, the gender pay gap in Australia stood at 17.3%. FT AWE of men ($1,602.80) compared to women ($1,325.10), a difference of $277.70 per week.
Australian Legislation: Sex Discrimination Act (1984) Kate Jenkins
a) Promote equality between men and women;
b) Eliminate discrimination on the basis of sex, marital status or pregnancy and, with respect to dismissals, family responsibilities; and
c) Eliminate sexual harassment at work, in educational institutions, in the provision of goods and service, in the provision of accommodation and the administration of federal programs.
Women in law firms
The percentage of female law graduates has been at around the 50-60 %mark for around three decades now (Lawyers Weekly, March, 2014), however, they account for only 24% of partners in law firms (Financial Review, 2015).
According Elizabeth Broderick (previous Sex Discrimination Commissioner), the system of billable hours employed by the majority of law firms in private practice could amount to sexual discrimination if it acts as an impediment to women seeking partnership.
Lawyers take maternity leave they get less hours and are more unlikely to get a partnership. Women have long been disadvantaged because of this system. Need a system based on lawyers overall quality, not quantity.