Relational Aggression Research Articles

The mediation effect of mentalization in the relationship between attachment and aggression on the road

Studies regarding aggression on the road are getting more frequent, due to the close relationship of these variables with risky behaviour and crash-related events. Whereas most of research has focused on both contextual and personality (proximal) variables, the current research aimed to explore the relationship between attachment styles (distal variables) and aggressive behaviour on the road, hypothesizing the mediation effect of mentalization. Then, a sample of 469 drivers (Mage = 35.60, SDage = 12.38; 66.1% female) taken from the general Spanish population completed a set of measures about their attachment styles (secure, anxious, avoidant, and disorganized), mentalization (alexithymia, mindful attention, empathy, and emotion recognition), and aggressive behaviour on the road (verbal, physical, vehicle-use related, displaced, and adaptive aggression). The results showed that driving aggression variables were significantly associated with self-sufficiency attachment style, as well as with empathy, alexithymia, and mindful attention. A further SEM analysis suggested that mentalization did not mediate in the relationship between self-sufficiency and driving aggression, but significant indirect effects were obtained in the case of the association between preoccupation attachment style and each one of the ways of aggression. Clinical implications of the results are discussed, in terms of the possible effectiveness of mentalization-based therapies to reduce aggression on the road, especially those which refer to alexithymia and mindful attention.

Self-, other-, and dual-harm during adolescence: a prospective-longitudinal study of childhood risk factors and early adult correlates.

Little is known about the childhood antecedents and adult correlates of adolescent dual-harm (i.e. co-occurring self- and other-harm). We examine the longitudinal associations between (a) social and psychological risk factors in childhood and adolescent dual-harm and (b) adolescent dual-harm and social and mental health impairments in early adulthood. Participants (N = 1482) are from a prospective longitudinal community-representative study. Dual-, self-, and other-harm were self-reported at ages 13, 15, and 17. Social and psychological risk factors in childhood were assessed between 7 and 11; early adult correlates at age 20. Groups with dual-harm, self-harm only, other-harm only, and no harm were compared. Between 13 and 17, 7.2% of adolescents reported dual-harm (self-harm only: 16.2%; other-harm only: 13.3%). Some childhood risk factors (e.g. sensation-seeking, parental divorce, victimization by peers) characterized all harm groups; others were common to the dual- and self-harm (anxiety/depressive symptoms, relational aggression) or dual- and other-harm groups only (low self-control, substance use, delinquency). Adolescents with dual-harm had reported more physical aggression and harsh parenting, and lower school bonding in childhood than any other group. In early adulthood, they reported more anxiety/depressive symptoms, psychopathy symptoms, homicidal ideations, delinquency, and victimization experiences than any other group. Adolescent dual-harm follows psychological problems and social disconnection in childhood and signals risk of psychopathology and isolation in early adulthood. To curb the burden from dual-harm, interventions must target adolescents, families, peer networks, and school environments. Differentiating youth with dual-harm from those with single-harm is important for developing personalized treatments.

Children's Navigation of Contextual Cues in Peer Transgressions: The Role of Aggression Form, Transgressor Gender, and Transgressor Intention.

When faced with transgressions in their peer groups, children must navigate a series of situational cues (e.g., type of transgression, transgressor gender, transgressor intentionality) to evaluate the moral status of transgressions and to inform their subsequent behavior toward the transgressors. There is little research on which cues children prioritize when presented together, how reliance on these cues may be affected by certain biases (e.g., gender norms), or how the prioritization of these cues may change with age. To explore these questions, 138 5- to 7-year-olds (younger children) and 8- to 10-year-olds (older children) evaluated a series of boy and girl characters who partook in physical or relational aggression with ambiguous or purposeful intent. Children were asked to provide sociomoral evaluations (i.e., acceptability, punishment, and intention attribution judgments) and social preferences. Transgressor gender only impacted children’s social preferences. Conversely, aggression form and transgressor intent shifted children’s sociomoral judgments: they were harsher toward physical transgressors with purposeful intent over those with ambiguous intent but made similar evaluations for relational transgressors regardless of intentionality. The present results suggest that gender is perhaps not uniformly relevant to children across all contexts, as other cues were prioritized for children’s sociomoral judgments. Since children likely have less familiarity with relational aggression compared to physical aggression, it follows that intent would only shift judgments about physical transgressors. This research provides insight about how children simultaneously navigate multiple cues in aggression contexts, which is likely reflective of their real-world experiences.

Head start parents' vocational preparedness indirectly predicts preschoolers' physical and relational aggression.

Severe poverty has profound impacts on child outcomes, yet much of the research on poverty fails to consider the psychological experiences of poverty, frames low-socioeconomic status families as a monolith, and until recently, has not considered the utility of behavior within the poverty context. This short-term (4 months) longitudinal study was designed to consider children's aggression as predicted by their inhibitory control (IC) and parents' experiences of poverty-related strain in an urban Head Start sample. At Time 1, parents reported on their family's economic situation (income, family size), education, vocational preparedness, and completed a measure of psychological economic strain; children (N = 90; Mage = 52.78 months) completed two IC tasks (Day/Night Stroop; Whisper). Four months later, parents completed the Preschool Proactive and Reactive Aggression survey, used to assess children's physical and relational aggression. Mediation analyses supported that physical and relational aggression were both fully mediated from parents' vocational preparedness, though through different mechanisms. Physical aggression was mediated by parents' psychological economic strain. Relational aggression was mediated through children's IC. Findings support the proposal that aggression should be viewed within context and that typical assumptions about developmental patterns of physical aggression may not hold for all children.

Influence of Attitudes toward Violence and Motor Impulsiveness on the Violent Behavior of Adolescents at School

Background: School violence during adolescence has become a major issue worldwide. Both impulsiveness and adolescents’ attitudes toward violence will influence violent behavior against peers at school. Our objective is to study the influence of motor impulsiveness and attitudes on adolescents’ violent behavior at school, as well as to assess sex and age differences. Methods: Cluster sampling was performed, obtaining a sample of 513 adolescents between 13 and 19 years from four centers of secondary education. Results: A strong relationship is found between violent school behavior, defined as relational and overt aggression, and attitudes towards violence perceived as legitimate defense and violence used to cope with problems and social relations. The results showed significant sex differences favoring the boys in all the variables studied, except for motor impulsiveness and relational aggression. In terms of age, we found significant differences only for motor impulsiveness, favoring the older age group (≥15 years). The current findings may provide an important core of evidence to support forensic decision making in pre-trial and court settings, and further contribute to recidivism prevention.

The development of forms and functions of aggression during early childhood: A temperament-based approach.

This study used a short-term longitudinal design with theoretically derived preregistered hypotheses and analyses to examine the role of temperament in the development of forms (i.e., physical and relational) and functions (i.e., proactive and reactive) of aggressive behavior in early childhood (N = 300, M age = 44.70 months, SD = 4.38, 44% girls). Temperament was measured via behavioral reports of emotional dysregulation, fearlessness/daring, and rule internalization/empathy and, in a subsample that completed a physiological assessment, via skin conductance and respiratory sinus arrhythmia. Emotion dysregulation generally served as a risk factor for all subtypes of aggression, with evidence of stronger associations with reactive as compared to proactive functions of relational aggression for girls. Daring predicted increases in physical aggression, especially among boys, and rule internalization predicted decreases in relational aggression, especially among girls. Rule internalization mediated longitudinal associations between daring and proactive relational aggression for girls. Some evidence also emerged supporting associations between adaptive functioning (i.e., high empathy, high respiratory sinus arrhythmia) and proactive functions of aggression. Findings highlight distinct temperamental risk factors for physical versus relational aggression and provide partial support for gender-linked theories of the development of aggression.

The effectiveness of brief self-regulation couple therapy (srct) on reducing marital covert relational aggression, changing of communication patterns and reduction of alexithymia among conflicting couples

The effectiveness of brief self-regulation couple therapy (srct) on reducing marital covert relational aggression, changing of communication patterns and reduction of alexithymia among conflicting couples

Developing Structural Equations for Marital Relationship Distress Based on Facial Emotion Recognition: The Mediating Role of Relational Aggression in Infertile Women

Developing Structural Equations for Marital Relationship Distress Based on Facial Emotion Recognition: The Mediating Role of Relational Aggression in Infertile Women

Temporal stability of relational aggression profiles in adolescents

The current study explored the temporal stability in relational aggressor's profiles over a 6-month period. Data were gathered at two time points from a sample of 2207 Greek junior high school students (52.8% females) aged between 13 and 16 (M = 14.04, SD = 0.81) years. This study also considered the role of callous-unemotional traits and hostile attribution bias in predicting profile membership. Results of latent profile and latent transition analyses revealed three distinct relational aggression profiles (i.e., low relational aggression, moderate relational aggression/high reactive indirect relational aggression, and high relational aggression). The examination of the short-term longitudinal stability of these profiles over a period of 6 months showed that their basic structure remained stable at both the within-sample and within-person level across measurement points. In addition, this study showed that callous-unemotional traits and hostile attribution bias affect adolescents' possibility of membership in all three profiles. Adolescents scoring high on callous-unemotional traits and hostile attribution bias were more likely to be associated with the more aggressive profiles, namely with the high relational aggression, and to a lesser extent, with the moderate relational aggression profile. Overall, this study demonstrated that the basic structure of relational aggression profiles remained stable across a short-term time period and provides numerous crucial practical implications including social-cognitive reframing interventions, as well as enhancement of social skills and empathic reactions.

Learner experiences of safety at public high schools in three South African townships: Baseline findings from the National School Safety Framework learner surveys

Background: Despite progressive policies and frameworks on school safety by the Department of Basic Education, safety remains a concern in South African schools. Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive design was employed using the National School Safety Framework (NSSF) 152-question learner survey, exploring perceptions and experiences pertaining to eight safety domains: dangerous objects, drugs and alcohol, bullying, verbal abuse, physical violence, discrimination, sexual violence, and journey to and from school. Grade 9-11 learners from 15 government-funded high schools in the Girls Achieve Power trial in Khayelitsha, Soweto, and Thembisa townships were surveyed (March 2018 - April 2019), sampling 10% of the school population. Data analysis included Principal Component Analysis (PCA), reducing correlated variables into fewer questions, then analysis on a scree plot by calculating eigenvalues; repeated PCA with those that had a minimum eigenvalue of 1 and Cronbach Alpha test for internal reliability. Eleven composite variables were included in the final analysis. Results: In total, 1034 learners completed the NSSF learner survey; 52.9% were female and the mean age was 16 years (SD=1.36). Results show statistically significant associations between four of the 11 composite variables in relation to sex. Over half (55%) of males have experienced peer provocation and relational aggression (p<0.001). Fifty-eight percent of females reported feeling unsafe on their way to and from school (p<0.003). Over half of males reported that their school was not effective in enforcing discipline (p=0.002) while 58% of females noted they could comfortably report any form of experienced or witnessed violence at school, to their educators (p<0.000). Conclusions: Violence continues to be a concern in South African schools. Interventions should work across the ecological model to effectively prevent and reduce violence at school and community levels. Strengthened NSSF implementation is critical to achieving this. We recommend NSSF learner survey adaptations to increase utility and implementation.

The Preventing Relational Aggression in Schools Everyday (PRAISE) Program: Adaptations to Overcome Subgroup Differences in Program Benefits.

The Preventing Relational Aggression in Schools Everyday (PRAISE) Program is a school-based program that has shown promise for reducing aggression. PRAISE, 20-session classroom-based universal prevention program, was designed to be appropriate and responsive to the needs of youth within the urban school context. A preliminary trial of PRAISE evinced positive effects for girls but was less effective for boys. Following the trial, the PRAISE program was adapted to enhance its impact for boys while maintaining its impact for girls. The current paper describes the changes and a new 3-school trial of the PRAISE program that examines its impact on subgroups. Results indicate that girls in PRAISE classrooms showed improvements in knowledge of social problem-solving strategies (SIP), reductions in hostile attributions (HAB), decreases in relational aggression, and suppression of overt aggression. Boys in PRAISE classrooms showed decreases in relational aggression and improvements in academic engagement, but no improvement in knowledge of SIP or HAB. Pooled analyses comparing boys' results from the initial trial and the current trial showed significant improvements in relational aggression and relational HAB with no differences in overt aggression, overt HAB, or SIP knowledge. Taken together, this iterative adaptation of PRAISE overcame many subgroup differences in program effects.

You can't sit with us…just kidding! An investigation into the association between empathy and prosocial teasing

AbstractProsocial teasing is the positive playful form of relational aggression, and studies have found children engage in playful teasing more often than aggressive teasing. Therefore, understanding the basic characteristics or skills that contribute to the more complex social skill of prosocial teasing is important. The current study focused on the role of empathy in students' perception of their engagement in two different forms of relational behaviors, playful and aggressive. Associations between empathy and engagement in playful and aggressive relational behaviors were investigated with 389 fifth‐grade students in the Midwest with the Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS) rating scale and modified Children's Social Behavior Scale—Self‐Report (CSBS‐S), along with gender interaction in those relationships. Results demonstrated that empathy was significantly and negatively related to the level of engagement in both relational aggression and prosocial teasing. No gender differences were found in levels of relational aggression or in prosocial teasing. Gender differences were observed in empathy, where girls reported higher levels of empathy than boys. Results indicated that empathy was a significant predictor of engagement in both relational aggression and prosocial teasing for both fifth‐grade boys and girls. Implications concerning these findings are discussed.

Identifying Relationally Aggressive Students: How Aligned are Teachers and Peers?

Relational aggression is characterized by attempts to damage another's relationships or social status and is a major concern affecting academic, socioemotional, behavioral, and health outcomes, particularly for urban, minority youth. Teachers and peers frequently disagree about which students are relationally aggressive. Factors associated with peer and teacher discordant and concordant identification of relationally aggressive students were explored including prosocial behavior, perceived popularity, academic competence, and gender. Participants included 178 3rd-5th grade students across 11 urban classrooms. Findings revealed that students were more likely to be rated as relationally aggressive by their peers but not their teacher as scores on peer nominations for prosocial behavior decreased, while teacher-rated academic motivation/participation increased. Female students were more likely to be concordantly identified by peers and teachers as relationally aggressive when ratings for overt aggression increased. These results highlight the utility of obtaining ratings from multiple informants as well as the difficulty in accurately identifying all students who may benefit from interventions targeting relational aggression. Findings also suggest factors that may be related to the potential shortcomings of current measures and provide avenues for additional research to improve detection of relationally aggressive students.

Romantic conflict narratives and associations with psychological relationship aggression in emerging adult couples

This cross-sectional study aimed to understand how emerging adult couples interpreted relationship conflicts, and whether such meaning making was associated with psychological relationship aggression and moderated by gender. We specified the I Cubed model of relationship aggression to examine how in the context of recounting relationship conflicts, the impellance factors of anger and break-up anxiety might increase and the inhibition factor of perspective taking might decrease the likelihood of relationship aggression. Each partner in 126 couples was interviewed separately about their unmet relationship needs. Narrative-based measures of impellance and inhibition were obtained as well as self-reported psychological relationship aggression and satisfaction. Although gender was not a moderator, there was some support for associations of impellance and inhibition factors with aggression. Extending prior work using couple observations and diary methods, we found that interpreting conflict events in terms of anger and perspective taking was related to relationship aggression while controlling for relationship satisfaction. Consistent with the I Cubed model, there were actor effects such that anger ratings were an impellance factor that increased and perspective taking was an inhibition factor that decreased the likelihood of aggression. Our findings suggest that narrating past conflicts related to unmet needs is a task that involves the management of anger associated with more relationship aggression. The efficacy of relationship education programs for emerging adult couples might be improved by focusing on skills to decrease anger and facilitate perspective taking.

Öğrencilerin İnterneti Cinselliğe Yönelik Kullanımı ve Bunun Cinsel Tutum ve Cinsel Siber Saldırıya Maruz Kalma Üzerine Etkisi: Tanımlayıcı ve Kesitsel Araştırma

Objective: This research aims to determine the students' usage of the internet for sexuality and its effect on the exposure to sexual cyber aggression and their sexual attitudes. Material and Methods: This descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted with 605 nursing students from two different universities. The study was conducted between February 2018 and June 2019. The data were collected using participant information form, which was prepared by researchers, the Hendrick Sexual Attitudes Scale, and Cyber Aggression in Relationships Scale. While making statistical evaluation, percentage distribution, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, chi-square, Cronbach Alpha reliability analysis and backward stepwise logistic regression analysis were used. Results: In the study, 33.4% of the students use the internet to learn about sexuality, 14.5% of the students stated that they were exposed to sexual cyber aggression. Besides, the students who were exposed to sexual cyber aggression were found to have more negative sexual attitudes and carried out more cyber aggression in their relationships (p<0.05). As a result of the backward stepwise logistic regression analysis made in the study, it was found that women were exposed to sexual cyber aggression 4.19 times more, while those who chat sexual topics through the internet 5.95 times more (p<0.05). Conclusion: A significant number of students use the internet to search for sexual topics and they were exposed to sexual cyber aggressions. It was found that exposed to sexual cyber aggression developed more negative sexual attitudes and perpetrated more cyber aggression in relationships.

PECULIARITIES OF EMOTIONAL REACTION TO EXTREME CIRCUMSTANCES OF LIFE

The article conceptualizes the problems of studying the phenomenon of the emotional sphere and emotional states of the individual. The content of scientific concepts that reveal the problem of emotional expression is generalized, scientific ideas about the influence of emotional expression on reactions to extreme circumstances of life are expanded. The study of the peculiarities of human behavior in situations of frustration is analyzed and the peculiarities of the manifestation of extrapunitive, introspective and impunitive emotional reactions of the individual are considered. The probability of manifestation of a certain level of somatic, behavioral and emotional components of stress in a situation of war is shown by studying the peculiarities of the direction of emotional reactions. It is established that individuals who demonstrate low levels of stress during the war have an impunitive orientation of emotional reactions, while individuals with an average level of stress are characterized by introspective emotional reactions. It was found that there is a direct correlation between high levels of stress and extrapunitive direction of emotional reactions. The main predictors of the formation of the presented emotional reactions and, as a result, the presence of an appropriate response to long-term stressful situations were identified. The article shows that the extrapunitive orientation of emotional reactions is determined by such factors as the cognitive-affective component of depression and a low level of well-being, activity and mood with a high level of propensity to use such a protective mechanism as projection. It was found that the predictor of intrapunitive orientation is a high level of depersonalization, a high level of aggression in relationships and depression, low level of mood. The following predictors of the impunitive orientation of emotional reaction were found: low scores on the scale of neuroticism, somatic manifestations of depression and the ability to recognize the emotions of others.

Features of adolescents’ value attitude to military service in various types of cadet educational institutions

The study of the value attitude of citizens to the protection of the Fatherland and military service, as an opportunity for professional self-realization, remains relevant. Currently, cadet schools and cadet classes have appeared in the national education system, which indicates the demand for the experience of cadet education. In this regard, the study of the value attitude of students of cadet schools and classes to military service seems interesting to us. The article presents the results of studying the evaluation-orientation component of the value attitude to military service of cadets of military educational institutions and students of cadet classes of secondary schools using the methodology of subjective assessment of interpersonal relationships. As we have shown, the comparison of indicators of tension, alienation, conflict and aggression in interpersonal relationships in groups of adolescents depends on the type of cadet educational institution.

The Influence of Parental Psychological Control on the Tendency for Smartphone Addiction as Mediated by Relational Aggression in Adolescents

This study examines the influences of parental psychological control on the tendency for smartphone addiction and investigates whether adolescents’ relational aggression mediated the relation of parental psychological control on the tendency for smartphone addiction in adolescents. The sample for this study was 374 students (M 196, F 178) from four middle schools located in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do. Variables were measured with the Psychological Control Scale-Youth Self Report (PCS-YSR), the Peer Conflict Scale (PCS), and the Smartphone Addiction Diagnostic Scale (S-scale). The data were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics analysis, one-way ANOVA, correlation analysis, multiple regression analysis, and the Sobel test. Also, the Baron and Kenny’s model (1986) was used to verify mediating effects. The results are as follow. First, differences in the tendency for smartphone addiction according to gender, the period when participants started using their own smartphone, activities performed most by smartphone, hours of smartphone use per day on weekdays, and hours of smartphone use per day on weekends were significant. Second, parental psychological control, relational aggression, and all subvariables of the tendency for smartphone addiction showed a significant positive correlation. Third, relational aggression turned out to mediate partially between both maternal and paternal psychological control and all subvariables of the tendency for smartphone addiction. The results of this study show that parental psychological control has direct and indirect effects on the tendency for smartphone addiction and describe the mediating effects of relational aggression

The Effects of Parent-Child Attachment on Relational Aggression among Upper Elementary School Students

The Effects of Parent-Child Attachment on Relational Aggression among Upper Elementary School Students

Investigation of the Prediction Status of Love Styles and Gender on Attitudes towards Dating Violence

Attitudes that support dating violence are also related to the severity and frequency of aggression in romantic relationships. It is therefore important to understand the variables that influence this attitude. The aim of this study was to reveal the mediation status of love styles in attitudes towards dating violence in gender in emerging adults aged 18-25. The study was conducted on 268 emerging adults (54% female, 46% male) aged 18-25 years (͞X͞=20.34). In the research, the “Dating Violence Attitude Scale” and “Love Attitudes Scale-Short Form” were used to measure attitudes towards dating violence and attitudes towards love, respectively. As a result of the mediation analysis, it was determined that the Ludus and Pragma love styles partially mediated the relationship between gender and attitudes towards general violence and physical violence in romantic relationships. The Ludus, Mania, and Pragma love styles were related to the relationship between gender and attitudes towards emotional violence in romantic relationships;. It was determined that the Eros, Pragma and Agape love styles partially mediated the relationship between gender and attitudes towards economic violence in romantic relationships. It was determined that only the Ludus love style mediated the relationship between gender and attitudes towards sexual violence in romantic relationships, while the Ludus, Mania and Pragma love styles partially mediated the relationship between gender and the mean attitudes towards violence in romantic relationships. Looking at the results of the mediation analysis, it was determined that the Ludus, Pragma, and Mania love styles partially mediated the relationship between gender and attitudes towards violence in romantic relationships. It can be said that men with the Ludus love style have a more accepting attitudes towards general, physical, emotional and sexual violence in romantic relationships compared to their female peers with this love style. It can be said that women with the Pragma love style have a more accepting attitudes towards general, physical, emotional and economic violence in romantic relationships compared to their female peers with this love style. It can be said that women with the Mania love style have a more accepting attitudes towards emotional violence in romantic relationships.