Frustration Agression

Question 1

Who put the the frustration aggression hypothesis forward?

Answer 1

Dollard and Miller

Question 2

What does the frustration Aggression hypothesis suggest about aggression?

Answer 2

• Aggression is a reaction to environmental stimuli.
• When an individuals goal is blocked and the individual cannot achieve this leads to a build up or increase in frustration. The frustration then causes aggression drive to increase and aggressive acts act to occur. When aggression takes place a cathartic effect is experienced which satisfies the frustration and stress. Which reduces the individuals aggressive drive.

A cathartic effect can take place in two different ways:

• Cathartic response displacement
• Cathartic response sublimation

Question 3

What is the frustration aggression hypothesis based on?

Answer 3

• It is based on the psychodynamic approach and the concept of catharsis.
• It views aggression as a psychological drive similar to biological drives such as hunger.

Question 4

What are factors that make aggression more likely to occur according to the frustration aggression hypothesis?

Answer 4

1. The proximity of the goal : If the individual is close to achieving their goal then the likelihood of aggression occurring is much greater than if achieving the goal os much less imminent or attainable.
2. Whether the aggression will remove the barrier that is causing the frustration: If aggression has a high chance of removing the barrier the likelihood of being aggressive increases

Question 5

What factors does the hypothesis recognise contribute to aggression not occurring?

Answer 5

1. If the cause of aggression is abstract
2. The cause may be too powerful and we risk punishment by aggressing against it.
3. The cause may be unavailable at the time so our aggression is displaced onto an alternative; one that is not abstract, weaker and is available eg. A pet or a sibling

Question 6

What is displacement?

Answer 6

-It is taking out our aggression on someone other than our main target.

Question 7

What is sublimation?

Answer 7

-Its taking out our aggression on something

Question 8

Outline AO3 for frustration agression

Answer 8

• Green jigsaw experiment
• Berkowitz
• Bushman

Question 9

Outline Greens Jigsaw experiment

Answer 9

• Male university students were given a task of completing a jigsaw puzzle
• there levels of frustration were manipulated in three different ways
  1. Jigsaw was impossible to solve
  2. Jigsaw was not solved due to running out of time because another student kept interfering with them
  3. Jigsaw was not solved due to a confederate insulting the participants

-The Participants were asked to administer electric shocks to the confederate and Green found that those in the third condition administered the highest voltage of electric shocks. Which supports the idea that frustration leads to aggression.

Question 10

Outline Berkowitz study

Answer 10

• 100 male undergraduates were given a task where they were given the opportunity to agress against a confederate by electrically shocking them
• Half of them were angered before hand by being shocked by the confederate and half were not

-Additionally Participants chose the voltage they could give to participants in the presence of a gun (agressive stimuli)
a badminton racquet (non agressive stimuli)
Or no stimuli

• Berkowitz found that angered patients who were left in the presence of an aggressive stimuli would administer higher voltages when shocking confederates compared to another participant in different conditions
• Therefore they concluded that aggressive acts that supposedly stem from unconscious motivation to satisfy frustration and reduce it. Actually arise due to the presence of aggressive cues which is criticism for the frustration aggression hypothesis

Question 11

Outline Bushmans study

Answer 11

Bushman conducted a piece of research that criticises the frustration aggression hypothesis

Students were asked to write a essay on a controversial issue and then read each other’s anonymously and add comments to them.

Berkowtiz gave back the essays to the original writer however with added aggressive comments on it that the researcher added himself.

The participant was split into two groups

1. They were told to punch a punching bag
2. Were told to wait quietly

Both groups were told to then administer white noise to the the participants they believe added the aggressive comments

He found that those who were told to punch a punching bag administered longer durations and higher intensity white noise than those who were told to wait quietly.

-He concluded that catharsis does not reduce Aggression.