Chapter Introduction

CHAPTER 12

Interpersonal Aggression

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TOPIC OUTLINE

  • Defining Aggression

    The Role of Intention

    The Harm Caused by Aggression

    Affective and Instrumental Aggression

    Measuring Aggression

  • Biology and Human Aggression

    An Ethological Perspective

    The Physiology of Aggression

    Natural-born Pacifists

    Uniquely Human Aspects of Aggression

  • Situational Triggers of Aggression: The Context Made Me Do It

    The Frustration-Aggression Hypothesis

    When Do Hostile Feelings Lead to Aggression? The Cognitive Neoassociationism Model

    Priming Aggressive Cognitions

    Inhibitors of Aggression

  • Learning to Aggress

    Electronic Media and Aggression

  • SOCIAL PSYCH AT THE MOVIES
    Violence on Film: Taxi Driver

    Application: Family Life and Aggression

    Culture and Aggression

  • SOCIAL PSYCH OUT IN THE WORLD
    Race and Violence in Inner-City Neighborhoods

  • Individual Differences in Aggression

    Gender Differences in Aggression

    Aggressive Behavior Across the Life Span

    Trait Aggressiveness

    Intelligence

    Personality Traits and Reactivity to Provocation

  • The Roles of Alcohol and Other Drugs in Aggression

  • Violence Against Women

    Domestic Violence

    Sexual Coercion and Rape

  • Reducing Aggression

    Societal Interventions

    Interpersonal Interventions

    Individual Interventions

All humans are capable of aggression, and monsters often don’t look like monsters. Does this man look like a mass murderer? Maybe not, but in 2011 he set off a bomb in an office building before committing mass murder at a summer camp.

Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.

Tina Meier gazes at a picture of her daughter, Megan Meier, who committed suicide on October 16, 2007, after being victimized by cyberbullies. Tina created the Megan Meier foundation (meganmeierfoundation.org) to teach others about the harmful effects of internet harassment.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1992, p. 102)

Our discussion of prejudice reveals that humans have done each other great harm because of differences in nationality, ethnicity, religion, and worldviews. If you total all the killings by all the known mass murderers over recorded history, they would make up a small drop in a very bloody bucket compared with the state-sanctioned killings that have been carried out in the name of some war or cause. In fact, laboratory research suggests that provoked individuals act more aggressively when they feel they are part of a group than when they are acting as individuals (McPherson & Joireman, 2009). Nevertheless, interpersonal aggression is also a considerable problem. Let’s first consider two cases of interpersonal aggression.

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On July 22, 2011, a 32-year-old Norwegian man, Anders Behring Breivik, first set off a bomb near a government building in Oslo, killing eight people, then went to a youth summer camp, where he shot and killed 69 young people and camp counselors (Mala & Goodman, 2011, July 22). Although some observers have suggested that mental-health problems contributed to Breivik’s horrendous actions, many of the factors known to contribute to aggression in general likely played a role as well. He was an isolated man, full of hostile feelings who had experienced failure and frustration in his life. He was also a fan of violent electronic media and hate-filled right-wing web sites (Schwirtz & Saltmarsh, 2011).

In the second case, a 14-year-old Australian girl named Chanelle Rae committed suicide after being the target of repeated cyberbullying (Dikeos, 2009, July 23). As her mother told news reporters, “Friday night she was on the internet and told me about some message that had come through, and she wanted to die because of the message…. I can guarantee you if she didn’t go on the internet Friday night she’d be alive today.” Cyberbullying can involve behaviors such as posting rumors and insults and uploading embarrassing photos, videos, and computer viruses. Because cyber socializing is so prevalent in today’s world, cyberbullying is a particularly invasive form of bullying. It can follow the victim home or anywhere with Internet access. Because of repeated instances of tragedies such as this, many states have enacted laws against cyberbullying (Donnerstein, 2011).

Fortunately, extreme acts such these two tragic examples are relatively rare. On the other hand, which of us has never insulted, pushed, snapped at, or even punched or kicked another individual (or wanted to) sometime in our lives? Almost all of us have engaged in at least minor acts of aggression. Such minor acts often do not cause serious or lasting harm to their targets. But consider the following statistics (Flannery et al., 2007; Hall, 1999; Rapp-Paglicci et al., 2002; US: Federal Statistics Show, 2007):

Reports of child abuse range between about 2 to 3 million per year in the United States.

Twenty to 30% of American romantic partners report that acts of aggression have occurred in their relationships.

On average, a woman in the United States is raped every 6 minutes. Over 70% of these rapes are committed by someone the woman knows. In addition, about 4% of male inmates in U.S. prisons report having been sexually assaulted.

Some American cities average more than one murder per day.

How can we understand such interpersonal aggression? As with all human actions, we have to look to biology, culture, learning, emotion, motivation, personality, and situational factors to gain a complete picture (e.g., Berkowitz, 1993). In this chapter, we’ll examine each of these factors and how they relate to different types of aggression. We will also briefly consider how to apply knowledge of the causes of aggression to reduce interpersonal violence in society.

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