Difficult to operationally define at it is partly shaped by societal and cultural norms.
Aggression (p. 471-472)
Biosocial Theoretical Positions (p. 476)
Frustration-aggression hypothesis (p. 477)
Learning by vicarious experience (p. 479)
What are some proposed definitions for aggression?
Behaviour resulting in personal injury or destruction of property
Behaviour intended to harm another of the same species
Intentional infliction of some form of harm on others
Desire to give all your love and affection to the dog instead of the friends you are visiting
Eating all of the chocolate
Defines a theorietical term in a way that allows it to be manipulated.
Operational definition (p. 472)
Evolutionary social psychology (p. 475-476)
Modelling (p. 480)
Script (p. 480)
Innate drive or impulse, genetically transmitted.
Instinct (p. 474)
Relative deprivation (p. 493)
Disinhibition (p. 488)
Innate death instinct.
Thanatos (p. 422)
Fighting instinct (p. 475)
Excitation-transfer model (p. 477)
Behaviour is genetically determined and is controlled by natural selection.
Ethology (p. 474)
Social learning theory (p. 478)
What are two compentents that contribute towards ethology?
Releasers (p. 474)
Specific stimuli in the environment thought by ethologists to trigger aggressive responses.
An extension of evolutionary psychology that views complex social behaviour as adaptive, helping the individual, kin and the species as a while to survive.
An extension of evolutionary psychology that views complex social behaviour as adaptive, helping the individual, kin and the species as a whole to survive.
Attachment styles (p. 483)
In the context of aggression, theories that emphasise an innate component, though not the existence of a full-blown instinct.
Realistic conflict theory (p. 422)
General Aggression Model (p. 492)
Through the biosocial theories view of instinct, what concepts share this view?
Learning by direct experience (p. 479)
Sexual selection theory (p. 484)
Theory that all frustration leads to aggression, and all aggression comes from frustration. Used to explain prejudice and intergroup aggression.
Sociocultural theory (p. 484)
Cathartic hypothesis (p. 484)
The expression of aggression is a function of learnt behaviour, some excitation from another source, and the person’s interpretation of the arousal state.
The view championed by Bandura that human social behaviour is not innate but learnt from appropriate models.
Components of Social learning theory.
Type A personality (p. 483)
Acquiring a behaviour because we were rewarded for it.
Hormones (p. 483-484)
Acquiring a behaviour after observing that another person was rewarded for it.
Tendency for a person to reproduce the actions, attitudes and emotional responses exhibited by a real-life or symbolic model. Also called observational learning.
Gender and socialisation (p. 484)
A schema about an event.
Personality
A sense of having less than we feel entitled to.
Dehumanisation (p. 488)
Sherif’s theory of intergroup conflict that explains intergroup behaviour in terms of the nature of goal relations between groups.
Descriptions of the nature of people’s close relationships, thought to be established in childhood.
Catharsis (p. 484-486)
Collective aggression (p. 488)
The ‘coronary-prone’ personality – a behavioural correlate of heart disease characterised by striving to achieve, time urgency, competitiveness and hostility.
Alcohol (p. 486-488)
Deindividuation (p. 488)
Psychological gender differences are determined by individuals’ adaptations to restrictions based on their gender in their society. Also called social role theory.
Sex differences in behaviour are determined by evolutionary history rather than society.
A dramatic release of pent-up feelings: the idea that aggressive motivation is ‘drained’ by acting against a frustrating object (or substitute), or by a vicarious experience.
Interpersonal aggression
The notion that acting aggressively, or even just viewing aggressive material, reduces feelings of anger and aggression.
A breakdown in the learnt controls (social mores) against behaving impulsively or, in this context, aggressively. For some people, alcohol has a disinhibiting effect.
Desensitisation (p. 497)
Process whereby people lose their sense of socialised individual identity and engage in unsocialised, often antisocial, behaviours.
Stripping people of their dignity and humanity.
Unified aggression by a group of individuals, who may not even know one another, against another individual or group.
Cultural variation
Institutionalised aggression (p. 507)
Sex-stereotypical attributes of a person.
Gender (p. 494)
Cultural norms (p. 494)
What contributes towards cultural variation of aggression?
Culture of honour (p. 495-496)
Subculture of violence (p. 496)
Machismo (p. 496)
Domestic violence (p. 503)
Crowding (p. 490-491)
Norms whose origin is part of the tradition of a culture.
A culture that endorses male violence as a way of addressing threats to social reputation or economic position.
A subgroup of society in which a higher level of violence is accepted as the norm.
A code in which challenges, abuse and even differences of opinion must be met with fists or other weapons.
A serious reduction in a person’s responsiveness to material that usually evokes a strong emotional reaction, such as violence or sexuality.
Anderson’s model that includes both personal and situational factors, and cognitive and affective processes in accounting for different kinds of aggression.
Aggression that is given formal or informal recognition and social legitimacy by being incorporated into rules and norms.
Intergroup conflict
Mass media (p. 497)
What profressions are considered to use instutionalised aggression?
National defence
Police
Psychologists
Sport
Massage therapist
Dentist
How do we reduce aggression in families?
Not rewarding acts of violence
Rewarding non-aggressive behaviour
Avoiding punishing behaviour
Transference
Catharsis
How do we reduce aggression at an interpersonal level?
Behaviour modification techniques
Assertiveness training
Social skills training
Non-aggressive modelling
Bobo the clown
Acting in a passive aggressive manner towards others
How do we reduce aggression at a societal level?
Political decisions / laws
Peace studies
Community will
Education
Road rage
Barking loudly at every stranger we see