Donnerstein & Wilson (1976) conducted a similar experiment and found, if participants were given control over the noise, levels of aggression decreased. In both of these experiments, aggression increased with noise but only if the participants were already aroused which suggests that noise has an indirect influence of the increase of aggression. Crowding Often, displays of aggression occur in crowds e.g. hooliganism within football fans or nightclub brawls in crowded venues and even ‘trolley rage’ in shopping centres. Experiments conducted by Calhoun (1962) involved the overcrowding of rat populations which gave rise to killing, assault and cannibalism.
Discuss the role of neural and hormonal mechanisms in aggression (24) Aggression is deliberate anti-social behaviour that is often intended to cause harm, usually observed through verbal or physical acts. There are two mechanisms said to be involved in aggression, neural and hormonal. Neural mechanisms such as the amydgala and the prefrontal cortex are thought to be involved in aggressive behaviour. The amygdala is a group of nuclei in the frontal lobe of the brain which is associated with primitive aggressive responses of instinct fear and aggression. The prefrontal cortex is in charge of thought analysis and regulated behaviour.
Us Against Them In wars, in cruelty, and even in sports there is a force that allows humans to fight, to abuse, and to compete. We separate ourselves from our opponents; we dehumanize them in order to justify our actions against them. The examples of this are many, they are driven by fear, and they only hurt those involved. In Matt Ridley’s book The Rational Optimist, he shows that humans prosper when they do not separate themselves from each other. In John Steinbeck’s book, The Grapes of Wrath, he shows the cruelties people are capable of when they do separate themselves from others and District 9, a film directed by Neill Blomkamp, makes clear what can happen when people dehumanize another species.
Research into Kluver-Bucy syndrome supports these findings as humans with the syndrome, as a result of temporal lobe damage, become passive. This is attributed to damage to the amygdala. However, contradictory research from Wong et al (1997) suggests that reduced amygdala size leads to reduced activity in violent criminals. Ashford (1980) suggests that stimulation of the amygdala leads to intermittent explosive aggressiveness, as people with temporal lobe epilepsy become very aggressive. The prefrontal cortex is also part of the complex system of structures involved in aggression.
Low serotonin levels can mean higher levels of aggression, with many studies finding this to be the case with violent offenders. What have research studies in the field of genetics had to say about the possible causes of crime? What is sociobiology? How do sociobiologists explain criminals? Sociobiology is the study of how biology affects behavior, with specific focus on how human nature is affected by genetic composition of a group of people sharing specific characteristics.
That is actually an exploitation of animals’ lives, especially mice. When a new vaccines or antibodies would like to be test, mice will need. How many lives do we take away from them for investigation? How many is enough to prove the vaccines or antibodies are actually working effectively? How many tests will be needed?
The evolutionary approach argues that gender role division is a consequence of the adaptation to the challenges and circumstances faced by our ancestors. This suggests that the role differences we observe are more a product of our biological inheritance and evolution than social factors acting on our behavior. As evolutionary theory is a biological approach to gender development, it suggests that our genes have coded aspects of human behavior because they were or are adaptive. However a debate to this approach is the nature vs. nurture approach, nature supporting the evolutionary approach being that we have evolved through survival and adaptation to the situations and therefore passing on the adaptive genes of the survivors. Nurture on the other hand is a view, is a view proposed by the social approach suggesting that behavior is affected by socialization and environment.
This is an abnormality in the set of chromosomes found in men- instead of the normal 46 chromosomes men with the XYY gene will have 47. Court-Brown (1965-67) analysed a sample of 314 hospital patients and found that those with the XYY gene were more aggressive than those without it. Furthermore animal studies have supported a genetic basis for aggression (Nelson 2006). However it is difficult to generalise the results of these animal studies to humans as there are significant differences in aggression behaviours between humans and animals. While animals may simply act upon aggressive impulses, humans have linguistic abilities to be able to communicate with an aggressor more effectively, reasoning skills which allow us to determine whether an aggressive act is the best option, as well as empathy to understand how our actions could affect others.
Baron stated that: “aggression is any form of behaviour toward the goal of harming or injuring another living being who is motivated to avoid such treatment.” (Baron, R.A. Richardson, D.R. 2004) There are four different types of aggression: Assertive act Instrumental aggression Hostile aggression Non-aggressive act. Many people see aggression in sport as a negative, but some sport psychologists agree that aggression can improve performance (Widmeyer & Birch, 1984). This type of aggression is called assertive behaviour (Bredemeier, 1994), this is where a player will play within the
The idea that humans are naturally violent has conceivably been examined and tested in psychology by the use of genetics, Milgram’s experiments, and the idea of Piaget’s cognitive development. To delve into the topic of whether humans are naturally violent or not, one must first have to understand, from a psychological aspect, if evil is a genetic trait ascribed from birth. While ascribed with a blueprint of life, our genes do not harbor a measurable philosophical trait of violence. It would be an absurdity to believe that at the time of infantry, where one’s basic thought processes are minimally structured at best, humans are capable of measuring philosophical feats such as right and wrong, or attune to a belief such as good and evil. This belief that genetics is not responsible for transferring violence is bolstered by an experimental incident.