Week 9 Flashcards
Aggression
Physical or verbal behaviour intended to hurt someone.
Physical Aggression
Hurting someone else’s body.
Social Aggression
Hurting someone else’s feelings or threatening their relationships.
Relational Aggression
Cyberbullying and some in-person bullying.
Hostile Aggression
Driven by anger and performed as an end in itself. Ex: murders.
Instrumental Aggression
Aggression that is a means to some other end. Ex: terrorism/war.
Instinct Theory and Evolutionary Psychology
An instinctive behaviour, and will build up if not discharged. Males find aggression adaptive.
Neural Influences
Prefrontal cortex (emergency brake) less active in murderers. Situational factors: sleep deprivation.
Genetic Influences
Hereditary influences the neural system’s sensitivity to aggressive cues.
Animals bred for aggression.
Temperments.
MAOA-L gene.
Biochemical Influences
Alcohol, testosterone, poor diet.
Frustration-Aggression Theory
Frustration produces anger, and anger is a readiness to aggress. Anger increases when the instigator could’ve acted differently.
Frustration
The blocking of goal-directed behaviour.
Displacement
The redirection of aggression to a target other than the source of the frustration. Generally a safer, or more socially acceptable target.
Relative Deprivation
The perception that one is less well off than others to whom one compares oneself.
Creates frustration.
Social Learning Theory
That we learn social behaviour by observing and imitating, and by being punished/rewarded.
Aggression as Learned Social Behaviour
Rewards, observational learning through family and culture.
Influences on Aggression
Aversive incidents (pain, heat , attacks), arousal, aggression cues (guns), media influences, group influences (polarization/deindividuation).
Media Influences
Pornography and sexual violence teach distorted perceptions of sexual reality, and violence towards women.
Why does media viewing affect behaviour?
arousal, disinhibits, evokes imitation.
Media effects of thinking
desensitization, social scripts, altered perceptions, cognitive priming.
Social Scripts
Culturally provided mental instructions for how to act in various situations.
How can aggression be reduced?
Catharsis theory (Aristotle), social learning (teaching).
How is catharsis theory wrong?
If true, will promote more aggressive responses to situations.
Venting causes more anger (polarization).
