Aggression - AO1

Aggression - AO1

1. Instituational

   • Importation
     • Individuals bring their characteristics and values into the institution
       • If enough people value violence this will become the norm and IA will occur
   • Deprivation
     • The deprivations prisoners face cause them to act aggressively
       • Eg. Loss of autonomy
       • Aggression is seen as a way of gaining control

2. Biological

   • Hormonal
     • Testosterone
       • Makes it more likely that behaviour will be carried out
       • Increase in testosterone = More aggressive
   • Neural
     • Serotonin
       • Low = Aggression
     • Serotonin receptors
       • High = Aggressive

3. Genetic

   • MAOA
     • Gene for aggression
   • Twin Studies
     • McGuffin and Gottesman
       • Mz twins = 87% concordance Dz twins = 72% concordance
     • Mason and Frick
       • Meta-analysis of 12 studies
         • Approx 50% of differences in aggressive and antisocial behaviour could be accounted to genetics
     • Coccaro et al
       • 182 Mz twins and 118 Dz twins
         • Genes accounted for approx 50% of differences in aggression
   • Adoption studies
     • Hutchings and Mednick
       • 14,000 adoptions in Denmark
         • Positive correlation between the number of convictions for criminal violence among the biological parents and their adopted sons
     • Miles and Carey
       • 24 twin and adoption studies
         • Strong genetic influence which accounted for as much as 50% of variance in aggression

4. Group Displays

   • Xenophobia
     • A fear or hatred of strangers or foreigners
     • Shaw and Wong
       • The mechanisms that prompt suspicion towards strangers would have been favoured by natural selection enabling our ancestors to avoid attack
     • MacDonald
       • It is adaptive to exaggerate negative stereotypes about our outsiders as the overperception of threat is less costly than under perception
   • Territoriality
     • The protective response to an invasion of one's territory
     • Huntingford and Turner
       • This a common behaviour in animal species which typically show threat displays towards outsiders and attack with greater vigour when defending a home territory.

5. Evolutionary

   • Infidelity and Jealousy
     • Caused by females suspected infidelity
     • Led to mate retention strategies
       • To stop their partners leaving or committing adultery
     • Camileri
       • The Cuckoldry risk hypothesis
         • males will be more willing to use sexually coercive tactics like partner rape when there is a high risk of or actual event of infidelity.
     • Thornhill
       • Women who resist sex are signalling that they have been unfaithful
     • Shackelford et al
       • Men’s use of 2 broad types of mate-retention strategywas positively correlated with their violence scores.