4/2: Anti-social Behavior

• Aggression: behavior intended to hurt someone against the person's will
• "against person's will" added to original definition
• Two Categories
• Emotional(hostile) vs Instrumental
• two Types
• Direct vs Indirect
• how it's Expressed
• Can be Combined
• Direct Emotional: angry, throws chair at boss
• Indirect Emotional: under cover of night, deflates boss's tires
• Direct Instrumental: robber shoots guard attempting thwart robbery
• Indirect Instrumental: spin slanderous rumor to take someone out of picture
• Emotional aggression: aggression used because mad and wants to hit someone
• most typical form of aggression; malice
• Instrumental aggression: aggression used as means to an end
• no malice; done under obligation mostly
• Direct Aggression: face-to-face aggression experience
• Indirect Aggression: intended to hurt someone behind their back
• Causes of Aggression
• Biology
• Instinct
• predisposition
• Genes
• inheritable
• Neurochemcials- testosterone and serotonin
• former - positive related    latter- negative related
• CON: Not defined specifically enough
• Basic Learning Processes
• Instrumental learning: rewarded for being aggressive
• Observational learning: see someone get rewarded, imitate aggressiveness
• Frustration
• Frustration-aggression hypothesis- aggression always result of frustration
• Frustration - blocking of goal-directed behavior
• Displacement - redirection of aggression
• away from source of frustration, towards acceptable place
• Specific Situational Determinants of Aggression
• Aggression Cues- something associated with aggression
• more likely to aggress if see a gun
• Berkowitz and LePage (1967)
• Grade essays via Shocks
• Conditions:
•  Anger: Other subject said you should get high, 7, number of shocks  
• No Anger: Other subject said you should get only 1 shock
• Assigning shock to other subject. two conditions
• Gun on table = Aggression cue
• Badminton on table
• Critical Question: Angered person give more shocks when Gun is in room?
• Results: Anger, gun: 6.0 Anger, badminton: 4.8
• Message: Anger + Aggression Cue = More/Lead to Aggression
• Heat
• People Lose Cool when it's Hot
• Summer = season with MOST Crime
• Alcohol
• 75%  Crimes involved Alcohol 
• Direct Provocation
• Reciprocation; Eye-for-eye
• Proportionate response encouraged implicit in social culture
• Viewing Violence in TV and Movies
• Violent material
• huge effect
• Non-violent, sexually explicit material
• small effect
• Violent and sexually explicit material
• big effect
• Liebert and Baron (1972)
• watch tv show, play with others ; conditions: violent/nonviolent show
• result: violent show begat violence
• Eron and Huesmann (1984)
• data on amt of violent tv watched at age 8 and 9, aggressiveness rated, collected data on criminal activity 10 years later
• critical question: does tv violence lead to more aggressiveness down the road?
• results: Showed Increase in aggression Relative to kids who didn't watch as much tv
• Zillman and Bryant (1984)
• 36 movies over 6 weeks ; 2 conditions: porn movies, standard movies
• Weeks later, sentence rape defendant in mock trial
• Results: Males/females watched porn: lighter sentence and less support for women ; Males: report more negative attitudes toward women
• How Viewing Violence Promotes Violence
• Imitation
• "that's how you do it" 
• copycat killings
• Disinhibition
• "if they can do it, so can I"
• weakens one's inhibitions toward violence
• possibly related to desensitization
• Desensitization
• "yawn, another brutal beating"
• seen frequently, less concerned reaction
• Attitude Change
• "it's not really that bad"
• violence seems real, attitude toward violence becomes more positive
• Ways to Reduce Aggression
• Catharsis- discharging aggressive energy that continually builds up within
• once aggressive out, no longer there
• does not work, sets in place behavioral actions for later