How is aggression explained by theories and concepts belonging to the perspective of mainstream social psychology?
Introduction
Human aggression is a Social behavior whose study is from many perspectives. However, the theoretical models and empirical research from the perspective of social psychology, provide the most reliable framework upon which this concept of aggression can be understood. Therefore, from the perspective of mainstream social psychology, we endeavor to provide the critical definition of what aggression is, the significant theories of aggression, and the social psychological approaches in the study of aggression. The mainstream social psychology also describes the factors within a person that significantly increase their chances of aggressing, situational triggers of aggression, and the internal psychological processes that underlie any aggressive behavior.
The main definitions of aggression, according to mainstream social psychology.
According to mainstream social psychology, aggression is any behavior that is enacted by humans whose intention is to cause harm to another human who is keen to avoid that harm (Warburton and Anderson, 2015). The width of this definition is large enough to accommodate almost the full range of all aggressive behaviors to the extent that all activities that have the potential to hurt have been captured within this definition. It is worth noting here that some professionals wrongfully use the term aggression with related concepts like anger and hostility, but it should be remembered that in psychology, the term aggression refers explicitly to behavior and not an emotional state or mindset. Also, worth noting is that some people also use the term aggression interchangeably with the term violence, and this has an effect of confusing policymakers, researchers, and the general public. It should be understood that violence is, of course, aggression, whose intention is to cause harm that is severe enough to warrant medical attention, and it can even cause death. Therefore, Warburton and Anderson (2015), conclude that violent behavior is indeed aggression; however, most of the behavior that is termed as aggressive is not violence.
Forms of aggression according to mainstream social psychology.
The forms of aggression include causing physical harm through actions like kicking, biting, shooting, etc., verbal aggression like yelling and screaming to a person, relational aggression which is causing harm to a person’s reputation either verbally or digitally. It is also important to note that aggression can be direct, meaning that the victim of this behavior is physically present or indirect, implying that the behavior is enacted in the absence of the victim, for instance smashing someone’s car or spreading a bad rumor about someone.
Warburton and Anderson (2015), further point out that aggression differ by function in that it may entail pure intent to hurt the targeted victim and in this case, we have affective, retaliatory, hostile, reactive or impulsive aggression, or aggression can entail a plan that is deliberate to harm another person so that the desired outcome can be achieved. In this case, we have planned, proactive, instrumental, or cold aggression. Aggression also maybe as a result of an automatic response that may be a result of a desired to protect oneself.
Mainstream Socio-Psychological Theories of Aggression.
Learning theories
According to this theory, the behavior is explained in terms of classical conditioning, i.e., learning to associate one phenomenon with another. This theory postulates that once human beings learn to associate things in pairs mentally, they are conditioned to expect that the occurrence of these things will happen together. The theories of operant conditioning supplemented this theory, whereby the theorists argued that human being has a high likelihood of repeating behavior that has rewards and shuns behavior that attracts punishment. Aggression research points out that young children can be taught aggression through rewarding aggressive behavior. This is commonly known as positive reinforcement. The same children can also be taught aggressive behavior through the removal of consequences after aggression in what is known as negative reinforcement.
Other social psychologists, like Bendura, proposed that social behaviors like aggression could be acquired through observation and imitation of others. On the same note, the concept of Vicarious conditioning was developed by Bendura, which postulated that young children had a high propensity to imitate models that had been rewarded for their aggressive behavior.
Mainstream cognitive theories
According to social psychologist, two main theories of aggression emerged that attempted to explain aggression. The first is the social information processing (SIP) theory, and the second one is the script theory. The SIP theory postulated that the perception of the behavior of other people make attributions about what the motive of the behavior was. Concepts like hostile attribution bias, which the propensity to construe ambiguous events like being steeped on to have hostile intent, emerged fromthis his theory. Script theory, on the other hand, points out that human behavior is acquired through either directly experiencing behavior or observational learning.
The general aggression model is one of the recent theories of aggression. The design of this theory isto account for the effectsof a wide array of variables that affectaggression.
The frustration-Aggression Hypothesis
The frustration-Aggression Hypothesis is considered to be the earliest social psychological theory that attempts to study aggression form a critical perspective. It was proposed in 1939 by Dollard, and it was based on the assumptions of psychoanalytic theory, and the theorists focused on the frustration that was as a result of a blocked goal. The proponents of this theory postulated that an aggressive behavior always points out to an existing frustration of some kind. If there exists any frustration, it will lead to some form of aggression. This theory provides an essential framework in which present conceptualizations of social aggression can be done. This theory enjoyed some form of empirical support for some time; however, it was soon discovered that not every form of frustration led to aggressive behavior.
What limitations do these explanations have, based on a critical social psychological perspective?
Using mainstream social psychology to explain aggression has got some limitations to form the perspective of critical social psychology. Critical social psychology expands the study of aggression further by drawing attention of the social factors that impact people, an approach that is ignored by the mainstream social psychology. Mainstream social psychological studies do not emphasize the contextual influences that shape an individual’s experiences and behavior, but critical social psychology does.
In studying aggression, mainstream social psychologists only study individual differences of aggression. A test may be developed to identify individuals who may be prone to aggression so that they may be helped. The limitation of this approach is that when problems are explained in terms of individuals, issues are developed that are only focused on individuals. However, critical social psychologists take into consideration the general environment surrounding the individual that may lead to aggression so that solutions may be found by eliminating the root cause of aggression.
Another limitation with mainstream social psychology is that it makes the assumption that researches will ultimately be objective and independent when studying aggression. However, from the perspective of critical social psychology, no research can be neutral since it is not possible to separate a researcher from the social environment in which he lives. Therefore, the study of aggression has to be influenced by societal values and beliefs. Mainstream social psychology tries to explain a difference in a particular phenomenon like aggression from an individual perspective. However, the differences that may be noted in the individuals concerning this phenomenon under study may be purely due to cultural specify and no other factor.
A theoretical idea about people that is rampant in the mainstream social psychology is that individuals are deemed to be information processors. Therefore, stereotypes that emerge are considered to be a natural consequence of the information that the human mind needs to process and its limitations in cognitive capabilities. Critical social psychology postulates that an information processing theory of prejudice is individualistic. Because of this, it fails to explain the differences that exist in groups and not individuals. Further, the suggestion by mainstream psychologists that prejudice in the study of phenomena like aggression is a natural and inevitable result of the thought process fails to promote social change.
From the perspective, if critical psychology, mainstream social psychology tends to oversimplify the complexity of human psychology and behavior, and it tends to ignore the importance of personal influences on the responses that individuals give. It should be understood that human beings tend to behave differently when they are at different places or at different times. Therefore the assumption by mainstream social psychology that a person’s response during a survey is stable and lasting is faulty.
How would aggression be conceptualized from the perspective of critical social psychology
The mainstream social psychology has mainly been focused on physical behavior. However, there has been recent interest in the constructs of indirect, relational, and social aggression. This new interest in aggression has prompted the reconceptualization and the reexamination of the function, operationalization, and form of aggressive behavior. In the recent past, there has been a significant effort to understand the non-physical forms of aggression (Nicole and Mitchel, 2008).Critical social psychology has conceptualized aggression to include behaviors that cause social rather than physical harm. Aggression has been conceptualized by critical psychologists to involve manipulation of peer relationships.
Theoretically, the methods and the constructs that have been historically derived it the study of physical aggression have been significant in the expansion of knowledge of socially aggressive behaviors, however over time; it has become clear that new theories and models that define and classify social aggression are needed. Typically, a behavior is deemed to be aggressive if it intends to cause harm, and if the target perceives the harm caused to be the result of the aggressor’s actions. Many forms of physical aggression meet this criterion since physical behaviors define them. Problems, however, arise when the application of the same ideas is done socially aggressive behavior. The definition of social aggression demands that social context be considered, and therefore we can’t reduce it to just a set of observable behaviors. Using this conceptualization, aggression has been known to include and represent emotional expression rather than behaviors directed to a particular target.
Social constructionism is also a critical theory that explains aggressive behavior. Proponents of this theory argue that behavior problems should be studies from outside the person and not from within the person.
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