Hurtful Behavior Research Articles

Gender and sexuality: emerging perspectives from the heterosexual epidemic in South Africa and implications for HIV risk and prevention

Research shows that gender power inequity in relationships and intimate partner violence places women at enhanced risk of HIV infection. Men who have been violent towards their partners are more likely to have HIV. Men's behaviours show a clustering of violent and risky sexual practices, suggesting important connections. This paper draws on Raewyn Connell's notion of hegemonic masculinity and reflections on emphasized femininities to argue that these sexual, and male violent, practices are rooted in and flow from cultural ideals of gender identities. The latter enables us to understand why men and women behave as they do, and the emotional and material context within which sexual behaviours are enacted.In South Africa, while gender identities show diversity, the dominant ideal of black African manhood emphasizes toughness, strength and expression of prodigious sexual success. It is a masculinity women desire; yet it is sexually risky and a barrier to men engaging with HIV treatment. Hegemonically masculine men are expected to be in control of women, and violence may be used to establish this control. Instead of resisting this, the dominant ideal of femininity embraces compliance and tolerance of violent and hurtful behaviour, including infidelity.The women partners of hegemonically masculine men are at risk of HIV because they lack control of the circumstances of sex during particularly risky encounters. They often present their acquiescence to their partners' behaviour as a trade off made to secure social or material rewards, for this ideal of femininity is upheld, not by violence per se, by a cultural system of sanctions and rewards. Thus, men and women who adopt these gender identities are following ideals with deep roots in social and cultural processes, and thus, they are models of behaviour that may be hard for individuals to critique and in which to exercise choice. Women who are materially and emotionally vulnerable are least able to risk experiencing sanctions or foregoing these rewards and thus are most vulnerable to their men folk.We argue that the goals of HIV prevention and optimizing of care can best be achieved through change in gender identities, rather than through a focus on individual sexual behaviours.

How Young is Too Young? Exploring Beginning Teachers' Assumptions about Young Children and Teaching for Social Justice

This study investigates what preservice elementary school teachers assume about children's capacities to learn about equity issues and how teachers might translate teaching for social justice into actual classroom practices. Participants said they did not see the age of their students as a barrier to teaching for social justice, although their ways of conceptualizing this varied considerably, and those teaching grade 4–6 students were generally more risk-taking in the curricular and pedagogical choices they made. We found that the concepts of childhood innocence and developmental appropriateness mediated the topics and approach to topics that beginning teachers considered. Roughly half the participants believed that younger children are relatively uninterested in the events of the day, are incapable of forming nuanced opinions, and are unable to analyze political issues; while the other half disagreed. Participants concerned about engendering negative emotional responses from elementary students made more limited and generic responses to name-calling or teasing rather than naming specific forms of oppression or prompting students to reflect critically on hurtful language and behavior.

Peer provocation in physical education: experiences of Botswana adolescents

Critical incidents of peer provocation in physical education were investigated among 675 junior secondary school students in Botswana. Data were generated through a brief, open‐ended questionnaire requesting the students to narrate their experiences of bad, hurtful and offensive peer behaviours during physical education classes. Six overlapping categories of peer provocation that emerged from the data were: humiliation, injustice, physical assaults, sexual harassment; dangerous play and female physicality frighteners. These categories are discussed with reference to the themes central to boys’ and girls’ experiences. To the extent that peer provocation is differentially aimed at boys and girls, it is crucial to recurrently (en)gender its analysis. This study encourages educators in general and physical education teachers in particular to take heightened interest in, and reflect more critically about proactive ways to address the multiple domains and consequences of peer provocation in physical education settings.

Longitudinal Outcome of Youth Oppositionality: Irritable, Headstrong, and Hurtful Behaviors Have Distinctive Predictions

ObjectiveOppositional behavior in youths is one of the strongest predictors of a wide range of psychiatric disorders. We test the hypothesis that oppositionality encompasses an Irritable, a Headstrong, and a Hurtful dimension, each with distinct predictions. MethodLongitudinal design combining data from two British national surveys and their respective 3-year follow-ups (N = 7,912). The Developmental and Well-Being Assessment was used to generate DSM-IV diagnoses. ResultsThe Irritable dimension was the sole predictor of emotional disorders at follow-up and was particularly associated with distress disorders (depression and anxiety) rather than fear disorders (phobias, separation anxiety, and panic disorder), both before and after adjustment for baseline psychopathology. The Headstrong dimension was the only predictor of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder at follow-up. Both Headstrong and Hurtful predicted conduct disorder, although only the Headstrong dimension did so after adjustment for baseline psychopathology. The Hurtful dimension was the strongest predictor of aggressive conduct disorder symptoms. ConclusionsOur data suggest a developmental model of mental disorder whereby oppositionality is an interim shared manifestation of different dimensions of psychopathology with distinct outcomes.

Voices of the Diaspora: Jewish Women Writing in Contemporary Europe (review)

Reviewed by: Voices of the Diaspora: Jewish Women Writing in Contemporary Europe Mara R. Wade Voices of the Diaspora: Jewish Women Writing in Contemporary Europe, edited by Thomas Nolden and Frances Malino. Evanston, Illinois: Northwestern University Press, 2005. 146 pp. $59.95 (c); $21.95 (p). This anthology offers a selection of contemporary stories and essays by Jewish women writers from across Europe, thereby providing both a judicious sampling for scholars wanting to expand their acquaintance with writers from various traditions and a handy collection suitable for classroom purposes. The introduction by Thomas Nolden deftly balances the portrayal of the women authors in the context of Jewish writers (male and female), of earlier Jewish women writers, and of their national traditions. This anthology allows readers to make a first acquaintance with these diverse writers so that their positions both as a group and as individuals within modern ( Jewish) literature can be studied further. Each story is prefaced by a brief biography of the author. These texts provide a rich sampling in various short prose forms, beginning with the French-Moroccan Marlène Amar’s “On the Edge of the World,” the story of an obsessively observant girl, Fortune, who lives at the edge of the desert. The story’s title alludes to her marginality on several levels. She is “on the edge of the world” geographically in her childhood home, socially at the margins of her family and community, and individually through her self-imposed isolation. The story opens with a stark depiction of how the male child is infinitely preferable to the female one and closes with the celebrations for the birth of a son, accompanied by the raucous drunkenness of the men and Fortune’s deliberate self-exclusion by taking refuge on the other side of the wadi. Reina Roffé continues this theme of female marginality in her “Exotic Birds,” a story of the narrator’s aunt. Truly a strange bird, her relative, full of unnamed longings, is invisible to others, even members of her own family, who [End Page 161] pass her on the street without notice as she expectantly awaits a familiar greeting. Tellingly, her only two known transgressions are to have twice posed as a male to complete a minyan. The conclusion focuses on the aunt’s eyes, her gaze compared to that of a gamekeeper surveying rare birds. In this reflex she has accomplished a profound perspectival switch, now everyone else is strange to her. The title of this subdivision, “Displacement,” alludes to the displacement not only of the protagonists of these stories, but also of the authors and their emigration. The section called “Reemergence” opens with the Austrian Ruth Beckman’s “Beyond the Bridges,” an essay about the absence of the past in the present, tracing her walk through “Matzoh Island,” as Vienna’s largely Jewish second district was known. Beckman’s text reminds readers of the profound differences between the experiences of post-Holocaust German and Austrian Jews and thematizes the lacunae in the new generation’s knowledge of pre-war Vienna. The editors should have revised the extremely stiff, Teutonic prose of this awkward translation into idiomatic English for republication here. The Russian-born French writer Myriam Assinimow’s insightful essay, “A Yiddish Writer Who Writes in French,” recalls the world of Yiddish—its language and its culture—and alludes to yet another sphere of loss with the Shoah. She sensitively explores what it means to be a child survivor with a modern hybrid identity, explaining how, while she writes in French, her work is imbued with the Yiddish world. The Italian author Clara Sereni’s story “Jews” differs from the other two in this section in that is not an autobiographical essay explaining the author’s position in contemporary literature and instead is a work of fiction, depicting cross-generational experiences with Jewish playmates. She deftly shows how insidious patterns of childhood prejudice during the Shoah are replicated in the life of the granddaughter. With her anti-Jewishness, the grandmother cuts short her granddaughter’s opportunity to have a Jewish playmate, passing on hurtful behavior to another generation. The section “Defiance” opens with a complex tale, “March 1953,” of Stalinist...

A Violence-Prevention Program Helps Teach Medical Students and Pediatric Residents About Childhood Aggression

There were 65 third-year medical students and 59 pediatric residents who participated. The intervention was a 40-minute multimedia program that teaches how to counsel parents about childhood aggression. Comparing pre- and 2-month postintervention data, there was an increase in the proportion of medical students (11% pre vs 92% post; P < .001) and residents (3% pre vs 95% post; P < .001) who felt that their ability to counsel parents about hurtful behavior was high or very high. Compared with baseline, a higher proportion of trainees at the 2-month follow-up recommended redirecting (11% pre vs 69% post; P < .001), promoting empathy (13% pre vs 42% post; P < .001), and not using physical punishment (25% pre vs 50% post; P < .001). A brief, independently viewed curriculum addition expanded the repertoire of health care trainees related to counseling parents about childhood aggression. These findings have implications for violence prevention.

Hurtful Family Environments: Links with Individual, Relationship, and Perceptual Variables

Family members create a social environment that varies in terms of the degree to which it evokes hurt. Two studies were conducted to examine the nature of hurtful family environments and to assess whether the association between people's experience of their family environment as hurtful and their perceptions of hurtful family interactions could be described by a sensitization or a habituation model. The results indicated that hurtful family environments are characterized by aggression, a lack of affection, neglect, and violence. Individuals’ views of their family environment as aggressive were negatively associated with their own verbal hostility and their self-esteem, but positively linked to their anxiety and to their tendency to see a family member's hurtful behavior as intentional. People's tendency to note their family displayed a lack of affection was positively linked to their own verbal hostility and negatively associated with their self-esteem. The findings also offered partial support for a habituation model: Those who said their family environment was characterized by a lack of affection rated hurtful family interactions as less emotionally painful than did others. Together, the results provide a rationale for examining the emotional contexts created by family members as well as the implications of those contexts for individuals and their family relationships.

“They do it just to show off.” Year 9 girls,' boys' and their teachers' explanations for boys' aggression to girls

ABSTRACT Because children and young teenagers usually associate in same-sex groups, study of aggression in schools has often focused on within-sex interactions. However, during adolescence, boys and girls increasingly interact with each other which provides the opportunity for constructive pro-social relationships as well as for damaging conflict and aggression. This paper examines the explanations of boys' aggression to girls provided in focus group discussions and individual interviews at four middle class Adelaide metropolitan schools by Grade 9 boys, girls and their teachers. Thematic analyses revealed some common and some differing explanations across boys, girls and teachers. All agreed that boys were verbally aggressive to girls in order to impress other boys and for their own entertainment or fun (i.e., to get a laugh). Boys and teachers reported that boys' offensive behaviour to girls was sometimes an attempt to impress girls. For some boys, the motive for hurting girls was revenge. Some teachers suggested that boys' hurtful behaviour may be explained by sexist attitudes learned at home. This study highlights the vital role of the peer group in motivating boys' aggressive behaviour toward girls. It also emphasizes the importance of understanding behaviour from the different perspectives of boys, girls and teachers.

Relational quality and communicative responses following hurtful events in dating relationships: An expectancy violations analysis

The present study uses expectancy violations theory to investigate hurtful events, relational quality, and communication in dating relationships. Participants ( N = 263) described a hurtful behavior performed by their dating partner and recalled their reaction to that behavior. When respondents evaluated the hurtful event as a highly negative expectancy violation and judged their partner as unrewarding, they were more likely to report breaking up, being less satisfied and committed, and using destructive rather than constructive communication. Individuals who were deeply hurt reported being slightly less likely to break up, more likely to be satisfied and committed, and more likely to use both constructive and destructive communication. Finally, victims who perceived their partners’ actions as intentional were more likely to report using destructive communicative responses.

Gaps in Pediatricians’ Advice to Parents Regarding Early Childhood Aggression

Persistent early childhood aggression is a strong predictor of violence later in life. To determine how well general pediatricians counsel parents regarding aggression management strategies, responses to open-ended questions and endorsements of specific aggression management strategies, among 27 pediatricians were evaluated. Sixteen (59%) screened regularly for aggression and 23 (85%) counseled (rather than referred) if there were parental concerns. Pediatricians were most likely to spontaneously recommend time-outs (85%) and verbal reprimands (78%) and much less likely to recommend other strategies such as redirecting (26%, p < 0.01) and promoting empathy (22%, p < 0.001). Pediatricians did endorse other aggression management strategies, however, when specifically asked about them. Pediatricians appear to take a limited approach to counseling parents of children with hurtful behavior. To increase health care providers' role in violence prevention, more systematic efforts are needed to increase rates of screening for early childhood aggression and to broaden the scope of how pediatricians counsel parents.

Navigating Power, Control, and Being Nice: Aggression in Adolescent Girls' Friendships

Female friendships (i.e., friendships among girls and women) are among the most important relationships that girls and women develop during their lifetimes. Gilligan (2003) proposed that women's morality and sense of self are based on connectedness and interdependence with others and that affiliation with and acceptance by other girls or women often become essential elements of identity. The process of establishing and maintaining friendships with other women is a crucial aspect of psychosocial development (Pipher, 2002), and as girls become adolescents, these relationships assume an increasing amount of importance, potentially assisting with adjustment and a sense of well-being. Research conducted during the last decade, however, suggests that girls are just as likely as boys to be aggressive in their friendships but that they use their social intelligence rather than physical aggression when in conflict. Girls, who tend to be more emotionally intimate in their friendships than boys, are able to use females' strong desire for connectedness as leverage against each other (Talbot, 2002). Unfortunately, relationally aggressive behavior can deprive girls of opportunities to meet their needs for friendship and emotional intimacy, both of which are important for their emotional health (Crick, Casas, & Nelson, 2002). Relational aggression (including socially and direct relationally aggressive behavior) can encompass a range of emotionally hurtful behaviors. Socially aggressive include gossiping; social exclusion, isolation, or alienation; writing notes or talking about someone; and stealing friends or romantic partners. Direct relationally aggressive behaviors, defined as the use of confrontational strategies to achieve interpersonal damage, include not talking to or hanging around with someone, deliberately ignoring someone, threatening to withdraw emotional support or friendship, and excluding someone from a group by informing her that she is not welcome (Xie, Swift, Cairns, & Cairns, 2002). Why do girls tend to use relational aggression when engaged in conflict? According to Bern (1981b), children rapidly learn and understand societal perspectives about gender and incorporate these views into their behavior. Girls with traditional feminine gender identities match their preferences, attitudes, behaviors, and personal attributes with traditional feminine gender schema (Bern, 1981b). Such gender role constructions (O'Neal & Egan, 1993) involve restricting the emotional expression of anger; this restriction may be extremely limiting for girls. Developing power through voicing one's feelings may result in hurting others (Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, & Tarule, 1997). Girls are expected to maintain harmonious relationships with others, and if they are concerned about the potential negative impact of the expression of anger on others, they will likely temper their reactions (Hatch & Forgays, 2001). Thus, because directness and overt confrontation are not consistent with a feminine gender identity, girls adhering to such standards are forced to use more manipulative and covert means of expressing anger, resolving conflict, and establishing dominance (Bern, 1981b). It is interesting that because of the diversity among young women in the United States, it is not possible to fit them neatly into the construct of gender identity. There may be quite different socialization practices for White, middle- and upper-class adolescent girls than for adolescent girls of color from middle- and upper-class backgrounds. For example, African American adolescent girls may encounter familial socialization practices that proactively prepare them for dealing with oppression, prejudice, and overt and covert discrimination. Robinson and Howard-Hamilton (1994) discussed Afrocentric socialization strategies that assist an individual's ability to avoid internalizing negative societal messages that can foster unhealthy self-images and self-depreciatory behaviors (p. …

III. Glares of Contempt, Eye Rolls of Disgust and Turning Away to Exclude: Non-Verbal Forms of Social Aggression among Girls

When girls seek to hurt one another, pursue their social goals, or express anger or contempt, they often engage in social aggression. Social aggression involves hurting someone by harming friendships and social status, and includes behaviours such as social exclusion, malicious gossip, and friendship manipulation (Underwood, 2003; similar behaviours have also been referred to as indirect aggression, Lagerspetz et al., 1988; and relational aggression, Crick and Grotpeter, 1995). This article examines the power and impact of nonverbal social aggression among girls, of nasty faces and gestures deployed to hurt and exclude. I do not argue that girls never engage in physical aggression – they do, sometimes with spectacularly negative consequences (Cairns and Cairns, 1994; Moretti et al., 2004; Putallaz and Bierman, in press). Nor do I mean to convey that boys never use facial expressions to hurt peers; boys may well use mean faces to exclude, or perhaps these behaviours are understood differently in boys’ groups. Last, by trying to illuminate how nonverbal forms of aggression might be part of ‘the subterranean worlds behind the messages’ (Reader, 1999: 85) in girls’ interactions, I do not mean to suggest that girls’ forms of hurtful behaviours are any more problematic than the more direct, physical forms of aggression among boys. Non-verbal expressions of exclusion and contempt may have special meanings for girls (Brown and Gilligan, 1993; LaFrance, 2002; Reader, 1999), and these seem important to understand in their own right and for their own sake.

Social support in families of children with chronic conditions: supportive and nonsupportive behaviors.

We questioned parents of 182 young children with a variety of chronic health conditions concerning the amount of emotional, informational, and tangible social support they received from the family, community, and service providers. We also asked parents to describe nonsupportive or hurtful behaviors received from family or community members. Both mothers and fathers reported that family members provided the most emotional and tangible social support and service providers the most informational support. The amount of perceived support from all sources increased over time, but 78% of mothers and 60% of fathers reported at least one instance of nonsupport from these same sources, primarily from extended family members and health professionals. We encourage health professionals to show respect and to provide timely, accurate information in a sensitive manner to parents whose child has a chronic health condition and to assist parents in handling nonsupportive behaviors from family and friends.

Our Society Is Not More Violent

The proposition that our society as a whole has become increasingly violent is now firmly imbedded into the psyche of the American public. As counterpoint to the unremitting tales of crimes in our newspapers and telecasts, waves of "experts" are brought forth to lament how each particular act of mayhem typifies the violent culture in which we live. Multidisciplinary conferences on violence are a growth industry. There is much wrong with this depiction of the violence "epidemic" (medical metaphors are popular these days), not the least of which is that it is inaccurate. If the term means hurtful actions and behaviors between human beings, I contend that there is considerably less overall violence in the 1990s than occurred 100, 50, or even 25 years ago.

Learning From Negative Morality

Abstract Based on a rich bank of research findings presented over 25 years in the Journal of Moral Education some possibilities are outlined for looking into future research. This is the theory of “Negative Morality”. It consists in the supposition that knowledge and experience of negative behaviour protects right or positive behaviour. Because of experienced “mistakes” the subject remembers this experience and thus more strongly resists a new moral trap. The question of indignation about injustice and shame about “real” unfair or hurtful behaviour will be stressed in a more cognitive and discourse‐orientated way.

Impact of dramatized television entertainment on adult males.

The authors studied the effects of a week's viewing of five types of television programs, including those with predominantly helpful or hurtful content, on the aggressive mood and hurtful behavior of adult men. They found, within the population studied, a significant decrease in aggressive mood and lower levels of hurtful behavior in viewers of helpful programs as compared with a control group, as well as some evidence that emotional arousal in response to helpful programs is negatively correlated with aggressive mood.