Hostile Takeover
Are People More Aggressive When They Are Worse Off or Better Off Than Others?
Dominique Muller et al.
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Who is more likely to behave aggressively? Is it someone outperformed by others or is it someone who outperformed others? For safety reasons, it is important to know the answer to this question. In Studies 1 and 2, participants were told that they did worse or better than an ostensible partner on a first task. Then they aggressed against this partner on a second task using loud, painful noise blasts. Results showed that participants aggressed more against someone they outperformed (the loser) than against someone who outperformed them (the winner). However, these results do not indicate whether participants were especially aggressive against someone they outperformed, or whether they were especially nonaggressive against someone who outperformed them. Study 3 included a control group and showed it was the former. These studies suggest that one should pay particular attention to winners rather than losers, because winners tend to aggress against losers.
----------------------
Of Animals and Objects: Men's Implicit Dehumanization of Women and Likelihood of Sexual Aggression
Laurie Rudman & Kris Mescher
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, forthcoming
Abstract:
Although dehumanizing women and male sexual aggression are theoretically aligned, the present research provides the first direct support for this assumption, using the Implicit Association Test to assess two forms of female dehumanization: animalization and objectification. In Study 1, men who automatically associated women more than men with primitive constructs (e.g., animals, instinct, nature) were more willing to rape and sexually harass women, and to report negative attitudes toward female rape victims. In Study 2, men who automatically associated women with animals (e.g., animals, paw, snout) more than with humans scored higher on a rape-behavioral analogue, as well as rape proclivity. Automatically objectifying women by associating them with objects, tools, and things was also positively correlated with men's rape proclivity. In concert, the research demonstrates that men who implicitly dehumanize women (as either animals or objects) are also likely to sexually victimize them.
----------------------
Facial width-to-height ratio predicts achievement drive in US presidents
G.J. Lewis, C.E. Lefevre & T.C. Bates
Personality and Individual Differences, forthcoming
Abstract:
Facial width-to-height ratio (fWHR) has been associated with aggression, unethical behavior, company profit, and dominance; however, it is currently unclear whether this facial trait relates to politically relevant character traits. Here we examine fWHR in an elite sample of political leaders, former US presidents (n = 29), who were rated for forcefulness, pacifism, inflexibility, and achievement drive; traits potentially linked to fWHR. The first three of these traits were unrelated to fWHR, but we found a positive association between fWHR and achievement drive (r = .58, p < .01), and a negative association to the trait "poise and polish" (r = -.38, p < .05). These results extend associations of behavior with facial structure to individuals in the highest echelons of power, suggest connections from biology to politically relevant character traits, and indicate that fWHR may also be associated with achievement-striving alongside associations with dominance and aggression.
----------------------
When Drivers See Red: Car Color Frustrators and Drivers' Aggressiveness
Nicolas Guéguen et al.
Aggressive Behavior, March/April 2012, Pages 166-169
Abstract:
Research has found that exposition to red is associated with physiological activation and fighting spirit. A field experiment was conducted to explore whether the color of cars is related to an aggressive response. Drivers waiting at a traffic light were blocked by an experimental car. The color of the car varied (blue, red, green, black, and white). The amount of time that elapsed until the drivers responded by honking their horns or beaming their headlights was the dependent variable. It was found that the red car elicited early aggressive response.
----------------------
Synchrony and destructive obedience
Scott Wiltermuth
Social Influence, forthcoming
Abstract:
Studies demonstrated that cultural practices involving synchrony can make people more likely to engage in destructive obedience at the behest of authority figures. Participants instructed to follow a leader while walking in-step with him felt closer to him and were more willing to kill sow bugs at the leader's request in an ostensibly different experiment than were participants in other conditions. The findings are the first to indicate that synchronous activities may be used to influence leader-follower relations.
----------------------
A relationship between verbal aggression and personal network size
Koen Vanbrabant et al.
Social Networks, May 2012, Pages 164-170
Abstract:
Aggression has been associated with negative social consequences. Yet, more adaptive views of aggression hold that it can have beneficial correlates as well. In four studies, we examined the relationship between aggression and personal network size, a property associated with important social benefits. The results pointed to a consistent positive relationship between verbal aggression and social network size. This relationship remained after controlling for third variables like extraversion and when using different measures of network size. The fourth study sought to explain the relationships in terms of mutual relationships with status and power, but found no support for mediation.
----------------------
Impression managers: Nice guys or serious criminals?
Christopher Davis, Jennifer Thake & John Weekes
Journal of Research in Personality, February 2012, Pages 26-31
Abstract:
High scores on measures of impression management are traditionally thought to signal dissimulation. Some have argued, however, that impression managers (IM) are as agreeable, self-controlled and interpersonally sensitive as they profess to be. We test this claim in a sample of recently incarcerated male offenders (N = 11,370) by relating attitudes and convictions to impression management scores. Data indicate that although offenders with high IM scores are less likely to project antisocial attitudes, they are more likely than those scoring low to be convicted of the most morally reprehensible crimes (homicide, sexual assault, pedophilia, and incest), and are more likely to receive longer sentences. The data suggest that high impression managers want to convey a virtuous persona, but their behavior indicates otherwise.
----------------------
F#!%ing Rudeness: Predicting the Propensity to Verbally Abuse Strangers
William Ickes, Anna Park & Rebecca Robinson
Journal of Language and Social Psychology, March 2012, Pages 75-94
Abstract:
In an online survey study (n = 275), several demographic and personality variables were used to predict scores on the Rudeness Scale, a new measure of the propensity to verbally abuse strangers. The results of multiple regression analyses revealed a number of significant main effects. These effects revealed that the people in the authors' sample who reported the greatest propensity to verbally abuse strangers were Hispanic/Latino or Black individuals who scored low in adherence to the standards of conventional morality but high in ego defensiveness (unwillingness to accept criticism or correction from others) and affect intensity for anger and frustration. The authors' interpretation of the findings combines insights derived from Swann's self-verification theory, contrasting views of ego defensiveness, and Larsen et al.'s work on affect intensity with a dispositional view of verbal rudeness that emphasizes its use as a weapon in interpersonal struggles for power, status, and "face."
----------------------
Is school bullying really on the rise?
Ken Rigby & Peter Smith
Social Psychology of Education, December 2011, Pages 441-455
Abstract:
Whether bullying in schools is increasing, as is widely believed, was investigated drawing upon empirical studies undertaken in a wide range of countries in which findings had been published describing its prevalence at different points in time between 1990 and 2009. Results do not support the view that reported bullying in general has increased during this period; in fact, a significant decrease in bullying has been reported in many countries. However, there are some indications that cyber bullying, as opposed to traditional bullying, has increased, at least during some of this period. The reported decreases in the prevalence of school bullying are consistent with reports of significant but small reductions in peer victimisation following the implementation of anti-bullying programs in schools world-wide.
----------------------
Honesty mediates the relationship between serotonin and reaction to unfairness
Hidehiko Takahashi et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, forthcoming
Abstract:
How does one deal with unfair behaviors? This subject has long been investigated by various disciplines including philosophy, psychology, economics, and biology. However, our reactions to unfairness differ from one individual to another. Experimental economics studies using the ultimatum game (UG), in which players must decide whether to accept or reject fair or unfair offers, have also shown that there are substantial individual differences in reaction to unfairness. However, little is known about psychological as well as neurobiological mechanisms of this observation. We combined a molecular imaging technique, an economics game, and a personality inventory to elucidate the neurobiological mechanism of heterogeneous reactions to unfairness. Contrary to the common belief that aggressive personalities (impulsivity or hostility) are related to the high rejection rate of unfair offers in UG, we found that individuals with apparently peaceful personalities (straightforwardness and trust) rejected more often and were engaged in personally costly forms of retaliation. Furthermore, individuals with a low level of serotonin transporters in the dorsal raphe nucleus (DRN) are honest and trustful, and thus cannot tolerate unfairness, being candid in expressing their frustrations. In other words, higher central serotonin transmission might allow us to behave adroitly and opportunistically, being good at playing games while pursuing self-interest. We provide unique neurobiological evidence to account for individual differences of reaction to unfairness.
----------------------
Good Guys With Guns: Hegemonic Masculinity and Concealed Handguns
Angela Stroud
Gender & Society, forthcoming
Abstract:
In most states in the U.S. it is legal to carry a concealed handgun in public, but little is known about why people want to do this. While the existing literature argues that guns symbolize masculinity, most research on the actual use of guns has focused on marginalized men. The issue of concealed handguns is interesting because they must remain concealed and because relatively privileged men are most likely to have a license to carry one. Using in-depth interviews with 20 men, this article explores how they draw on discourses of masculinity to explain their use of concealed handguns. These men claim that they are motivated by a desire to protect their wives and children, to compensate for lost strength as they age, and to defend themselves against people and places they perceive as dangerous, especially those involving racial/ethnic minority men. These findings suggest that part of the appeal of carrying a concealed firearm is that it allows men to identify with hegemonic masculinity through fantasies of violence and self-defense.
----------------------
Body Weight, Not Facial Width-to-Height Ratio, Predicts Aggression in Pro Hockey Players
Robert Deaner et al.
Journal of Research in Personality, forthcoming
Abstract:
Studies indicate that facial characteristics may predict behavior, but it is unclear if this will hold within highly selective populations. One relevant characteristic is the face's width-to-height ratio (FWHR), a sexually dimorphic trait that has been shown to predict aggression. That FWHR may predict aggression within highly selective populations was suggested by Carré and McCormick's (2008) finding that professional hockey players with greater FWHRs accrued more penalties. We attempted to replicate this result using all NHL players. We also explored fighting penalties as another aggression measure and height and weight as additional aggression predictors. We found that body weight predicted substantial variance in aggression but FWHR did not. Thus, in highly selective populations, inferences based on faces may be inaccurate.
----------------------
Facing Aggression: Cues Differ for Female versus Male Faces
Shawn Geniole et al.
PLoS ONE, January 2012, e30366
Abstract:
The facial width-to-height ratio (face ratio), is a sexually dimorphic metric associated with actual aggression in men and with observers' judgments of aggression in male faces. Here, we sought to determine if observers' judgments of aggression were associated with the face ratio in female faces. In three studies, participants rated photographs of female and male faces on aggression, femininity, masculinity, attractiveness, and nurturing. In Studies 1 and 2, for female and male faces, judgments of aggression were associated with the face ratio even when other cues in the face related to masculinity were controlled statistically. Nevertheless, correlations between the face ratio and judgments of aggression were smaller for female than for male faces (F1,36 = 7.43, p = 0.01). In Study 1, there was no significant relationship between judgments of femininity and of aggression in female faces. In Study 2, the association between judgments of masculinity and aggression was weaker in female faces than for male faces in Study 1. The weaker association in female faces may be because aggression and masculinity are stereotypically male traits. Thus, in Study 3, observers rated faces on nurturing (a stereotypically female trait) and on femininity. Judgments of nurturing were associated with femininity (positively) and masculinity (negatively) ratings in both female and male faces. In summary, the perception of aggression differs in female versus male faces. The sex difference was not simply because aggression is a gendered construct; the relationships between masculinity/femininity and nurturing were similar for male and female faces even though nurturing is also a gendered construct. Masculinity and femininity ratings are not associated with aggression ratings nor with the face ratio for female faces. In contrast, all four variables are highly inter-correlated in male faces, likely because these cues in male faces serve as "honest signals".
----------------------
Acting prosocially reduces retaliation: Effects of prosocial video games on aggressive behavior
Tobias Greitemeyer et al.
European Journal of Social Psychology, March 2012, Pages 235-242
Abstract:
Past research has provided abundant evidence that exposure to violent video games increases aggression and aggression-related variables. In contrast, little is known whether and why video game exposure may also decrease aggressive behavior. In fact, two experiments revealed that playing a prosocial (relative to a neutral) video game reduces aggressive behavior. Mediational analyses showed that differences in both aggressive cognition and aggressive affect underlie the effect of type of video game on aggressive behavior. These findings are in line with assumptions of the General Learning Model and point to the importance of the cognitive and affective routes in predicting how aggressive behavior is affected by exposure to video games.
----------------------
Vasopressin selectively impairs emotion recognition in men
Florina Uzefovsky et al.
Psychoneuroendocrinology, April 2012, Pages 576-580
Abstract:
The biological mechanisms underlying empathy, the ability to recognize emotions and to respond to them appropriately, are only recently becoming better understood. This report focuses on the nonapeptide arginine-vasopressin (AVP), which plays an important role in modulating social behavior in animals, especially promoting aggressive behavior. Towards clarifying the role of AVP in human social perception we used the Reading of the Mind in the Eyes Test and intranasal administration of AVP to show that AVP leads to a significant decrease in emotion recognition. Moreover, when comparing photos of males vs. females, all viewed by males, AVP had an effect on gender-matched photos only. Furthermore, the effect of AVP was restricted to recognition of negative emotions while leaving recognition of positive emotions unaffected. The current report emphasizes the selective role of AVP in male emotional perception and empathy, a core element in all human social interactions.
----------------------
Todd Kashdan et al.
Journal of Personality, forthcoming
Objective: Curiosity is the propensity to recognize and seek out new information and experience, including an intrinsic interest in learning and developing one's knowledge. With few exceptions, researchers have often ignored the social consequences of being curious.
Method: In four studies using cross-sectional (n = 64), daily-diary (ns = 150 and 110, respectively), and behavioral experimental (n = 132) designs, we tested the hypothesis that individual differences in curiosity are linked to less aggression, even when people are provoked.
Results: We showed that both trait and daily curiosity were linked to less aggressive responses toward romantic relationship partners and people who caused psychological hurt. In time-lagged analyses, daily curiosity predicted less aggression from one day to the next, with no evidence for the reverse direction. Studies 3 and 4 showed that the inverse association between curiosity and aggression was strongest in close relationships and in fledgling (as opposed to long-lasting) romantic relationships. That is, highly curious people showed evidence of greater context sensitivity. Intensity of hurt feelings and other personality and relationship variables failed to account for these effects.
Conclusions: Curiosity is a neglected mechanism of resilience in understanding aggression.