Aggression and emotion: Anger, not general negative affect, predicts desire to aggress

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Highlights

  • Anger partially mediated the relationship between relative mate value and direct aggression.

  • Anger partially mediated the relationship between relative mate value and indirect aggression.

  • Anger fully mediated the relationship between strength and direct aggression.

  • Anger mediated the relationship between mate value and direct aggression in men and women, and indirect aggression in men.

  • Fear, sadness, and embarrassment did not mediate a relationship with direct or indirect aggression.

Abstract

Many psychologists have theorized that negative emotions lead to aggression but what contexts trigger these emotions and how these emotions predict aggression remains unclear. According to the recalibrational theory of anger, anger is triggered when an interaction partner places a low relational evaluation on oneself, which motivates aggression (Sell, Tooby, & Cosmides, 2009). The present studies test the theory that anger mediates aggression and examine how other negative emotions relate to aggression. In Study 1, anger fully mediated the relationship between self-perceived mate value and self-reported direct aggression. In Study 2, anger partially mediated the relationship between relative mate value and self-reported desire to use direct aggression. Anger also partially mediated the relationship between relative mate value and self-reported desire to use indirect aggression. Further, anger fully mediated the relationship between self-perceived strength and self-reported desire to use direct aggression. For men, anger fully mediated the relationship between self-perceived mate value and self-reported desire to use indirect aggression. However, fear, embarrassment, and sadness did not predict aggression in any analyses. Results indicate that anger, but not negative emotions more generally, predict self-reported aggression.

Introduction

Though the topic of aggression is of great interest to behavioral scientists and has inspired many studies, the psychological mechanisms underlying aggressive behavior remain unclear. One of the earliest theories of aggression, the frustration-aggression hypothesis, states that individuals experience frustration when their attempts to attain a goal are thwarted and this, in turn, leads to aggression (Dollard, Miller, Doob, Mowrer, & Sears, 1939). Berkowitz (1988) expanded upon this theory by specifying that only impediments that were intentional or unjust lead to frustration, and that one's cognitive appraisal of the impediments are important in determining whether frustration leads to aggression.

Similarly, the theory of aversive stimulated aggression postulates that negative experiences, such as physical, psychological, or emotional pain, evoke aggression (Berkowitz, 1983, Berkowitz, 1988). Even exposure to hot temperatures has been hypothesized to increase aggression through increased hostile affect (Anderson, Deuser, & DeNeve, 1995). It has been hypothesized that aversive emotional experiences such as anger or sadness trigger fight-or-flight responses that may cause one to strike out in aggression (Berkowitz, 1988). Relatedly, researchers hypothesized that aggression is a means of expressing aversive emotions, which improves mood by ridding one of these aversive emotions via their expression (Bushman et al., 2001, Bushman et al., 1999). Other studies, however, have found evidence that venting anger does not lead to catharsis (Bushman, 2002).

Researchers have applied the model of affective aggression to include unpleasant affect caused by social rejection. Leary, Twenge, and Quinlivan (2006) reviewed the literature of interpersonal rejection and aggression, examining different theoretical frameworks for why social rejection leads to aggression. The authors state that people feel rejected when they perceive that another individual does not view them as a valued relational partner (or potential relationship partner). The authors seek to determine why perceptions of relationship devaluation elicit aggressive behaviors. One explanation is that people experience anger when they feel devalued (Leary et al., 2006). Indeed, researchers found that insulting participants increased their anger and aggression (Harmon-Jones & Sigelman, 2001). It has also been hypothesized that unpleasant emotions such as sadness caused by relationship devaluation may lead to anger and aggression.

The role of social devaluation and aggression makes sense from an evolutionary perspective. Facing aggressive others represents an adaptive problem that was recurrent over evolutionary history: the cost of aggression can include physical injury, death, and loss of resources. Therefore, individuals should be motivated to avoid or deter aggression. Further, one may gain a reputation for being an easy target if they do not defend themselves. In addition to utilizing aggressive strategies to defend oneself, people may use aggression to deter future aggressors (Buss & Shackelford, 1997). Hence, aggression may function as a social influence tactic. When an individual is devalued, aggression can send a message to that other individual, as well as to any observers, that they are not to be treated with such a low level of personal valuation. Evidence that people are more likely to use aggression when publicly devalued, compared to privately devalued, supports this perspective (Bond and Venus, 1991, Felson, 1978, Felson, 1982, as cited in Leary et al., 2006).

The recalibrational theory of anger provides an evolutionary perspective of anger and aggression that is consistent with the relationship between social devaluation and aggression, as well as a functional perspective viewing aggression as a social influence tactic (Sell, Tooby, & Cosmides, 2009). The recalibration theory of anger states that anger evolved to motivate the resolution of interpersonal conflicts in favor of the angry individual. When an individual is not treated with the appropriate level of regard, they experience anger. Anger, in turn, motivates them to inflict costs or withhold benefits so that the offending party recalibrates their level of regard (welfare trade-off ratio; WTR). WTR is calibrated according to one's bargaining position (i.e. their ability to inflict costs or withhold benefits) relative to the other individuals bargaining position (Sell et al., 2009). Indeed, when faced with a conflict, strong individuals (a cue to one's cost-inflicting potential) and physically attractive individuals (a cue to one's benefit-withholding potential) are more prone to anger than those low in strength and physical attractiveness. Consistent with the recalibrational theory of anger, strong and physically attractive individuals are more likely to win conflicts and report feeling more entitled to better treatment from others (Sell et al., 2009).

Anger has theoretically meaningful predictions for aggression calibration. Anger motivates one to aggress to recalibrate other's WTR to maintain one's reputation and garner appropriate relational benefits and minimize relational costs. Insight provided from the recalibration theory of anger allows us to predict a mediation model that is consistent with both the social influence theory of aggression and the relationship devaluation effect of anger (Leary et al., 2006).

First, an incident of miscalculated WTR, or relationship devaluation, should predict the use of aggression. An incident of miscalculated WTR or relationship evaluation involves another imposing a cost higher than the benefit one receives, that is not in proportion to their appropriate WTR. Further, if an individual imposing the cost is aware of their cost imposition it more likely represents their evaluation of one's WTR (unintentional cost impositions are less likely to elicit anger; Berkowitz, 1988, Sell, 2011). For example, an individual purposefully wiping ketchup off one's face onto someone's sweater, knowing whose sweater it was, should elicit anger (Sell, 2011). Second, aggression should be mediated by anger, that is, the incident also incites anger and that anger captures some of the variance the incident accounted for in the prediction of aggression.

It is less clear, from an evolutionary perspective, why other negative emotions would incite aggression. While others have theorized that negative emotions, in general, elicit aggression, I expect that only anger will mediate the relationship between provocation and aggression.

The present studies aims to test the recalibration theory of anger by manipulating the offender's mate value and, hence, the participant's relative mate value. Because mate value is one calibrating factor of WTR, individuals should be more likely to aggress when provoked by a conspecific with low in mate value than when provoked by an individual with high mate value. Further, anger should mediate the relationship between condition and aggression. Because mate value and strength are related to one's bargaining position (i.e. their ability to withhold benefits or inflict costs, respectively) they are important calibrators of WTR. Therefore, I also expect that anger will mediate the relationship between mate value and aggression, as well as the relationship between strength and aggression.

While previous research has examined the role of negative affect and anger in aggression, the present studies provides a novel contribution to the existing literature by testing whether anger has a unique role beyond negative affect using the recalibrational theory of anger. While there is evidence supporting the recalibrational theory of anger, those studies have not examined whether other negative emotions could also be predicting aggression nor have they manipulate relative mate value.

Section snippets

Study 1

While behavioral measures of aggression have many benefits, one drawback is that the established measures fail to distinguish between different forms of aggression that may have important implications, particularly direct and indirect aggression (Archer & Coyne, 2005). For example, previous research has demonstrated that self-perceived mate value differentially predicts self-reported direct and indirect aggression (Wyckoff & Kirkpatrick, 2016). Therefore, self-reported measures of direct and

Study 2

Because Study 1 demonstrated low base rates in self-reports of aggression, Study 2 investigates the psychology of direct and indirect aggression by asking participants how much they would want to aggress, rather than how likely they are to aggress. Previous research has used this approach to study indirect aggression (Hess & Hagen, 2006). While self-reports and real-world behaviors are important, external factors such as social norms may lead to lower self-reports of socially undesirable

General discussion

In support of the recalibration theory of anger (Sell et al., 2009), anger mediated the relationship between self-perceived mate value and direct aggression in Study 1: attractive individuals reported greater likelihood to use direct aggression than unattractive individuals and this relationship was mediated by anger. Furthermore, anger mediated the relationship between strength and desire to use direct aggression in Study 2: strong individuals reported wanting to use more direct aggression

Conclusion

The present studies clarified the role of emotion in aggression. While previous theories speculated that aversive emotions provoke aggression, the present research revealed that anger, but not other aversive emotions, elicits self-reported likelihood to aggress and self-reported desire to aggress. Although future research is necessary to elucidate the role recalibration theory of anger in aggression, the present study provided some support for this theory: those higher in strength become more

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