EPA-0568 – The evil inside us: impulsiveness and aggression in a non-clinical sample

Abstract

Aggressiveness is not an exclusive issue for justice and mental health systems, but rather a dimension present at different levels among all (Stone, 2009). In Kernberg's (2006) theory, also impulsivity is not conceptualized as pathological in any case, but rather a vulnerability factor for the development of psychopathology. Even if they often merge in the concept of’impulsive-aggression’, they seem to represent two separate, though overlapping, constructs (Garcìa-Forero et al., 2009). We focus on four facets of aggressiveness: hostility, anger, verbal and physical aggression; and three kinds of impulsiveness: motor, attention, and non-planning. The present study seeks to examine whether particular types of impulsivity are related with different kinds of aggressiveness, rather than to aggression-proneness in general. A mixed sample of 99 individual (age: M=35.85, SD=10.45 for men, n=49; M=26.58, SD=7.08 for women, n=50) was recruited. Impulsiveness was assessed by the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS-11; Patton et al., 1995), whereas aggressiveness by the Aggression Questionnaire (AQ; Buss & Perry, 1992). Age shown a moderate, negative, relation with aggression but not with impulsiveness. Gender, on the contrary, correlates only with impulsiveness, with men scoring significantly higher (t(97)=2.07; p<0.05). Although the two total scores (i.e. AQ and BSI-11) reported a significant relation (r=0.334; p<0.01), the higher value characterized the association between hostility and the attention component of impulsiveness (r=0.502; p<0.001). Other relations will be discussed in depth. Our findings highlight the importance to consider both impulsiveness and aggression pointing out the differences among their distinctive features.