Transcript presentation source

Social/pro-feminist Model
• Sattel contends that violence and aggression
are a means to power
• Violence must be viewed as a consequence
of social & cultural context.
• Our society gives men permission to be
aggressive, in fact encourages.
• Institutions encourage men to be aggressive
and women to be dependent
Power and aggression
• “We have created a society in which power is
defined as the ability to control others, with
violence as the ultimate form of control. Children
learn early in the home when violence is approved
and normalized. Children learn who gets their
way and who does not. Effects of pornography
as acceptable for men to view women’s role as to
sexual pleasure for a man’s need. The primary
message men receive is having someone sexually
vulnerable to you is the quintessential signs of
“maleness and Power”
Pro-feminist
• Socialization of children:
– Boy: competitive, aggressive, controlling
– Girls: dependent, vulnerable, malleable
• Aggression is dominant response to gain
and maintain power
• Being a “man” means calling all the “shots”
• Violence as a mode of coercive control --thus POWER
Social Learning Theory
• Three components
– Social learning/Modeling
– Frustration
– Various instigating stimuli
Modeling
• Huemann (1984) found in longitudinal study over
two generations significant correltations between
agessiveness of children and parents.
• He believes that children learn cognitive scripts
from models, which become strengthened by
rehearsal, repeated observation of live models,
viewing of violent films, and mental rehearsal in
children’s fantasy.
• Thus, the question became how do mothers and
fathers serve as models.
General social learning
• Modeling is like vicarious conditioning: an
individual imitates a model only if the
model is successful in reaching his/her
goals with the behavior in question.
(positive reinforcement)
• Bandura’s work
Learning theory
• Destructive aggression– Bandura & Walters
– Imitation
• Physically aggressive punitive parents tend to have physically
aggressive children
– Direct rewarding: TV violence, acting out as a means
of getting what is wanted.
– Punishment: extremely severe punishment reduces
direct violence toward the punishing person & is
associated with high levels of destructive aggression
towards other targets.
Socialisation/ learning approaches to
aggression
25
Acts of aggression
20
15
10
5
0
Live
Video
Cartoon Control
Bandura’s research suggests that aggressive
behaviour might be learned both directly and
indirectly.
Once learned, aggressive behaviour is more likely to
generalize to different situations and across time
This research also had a broader social impact
because it tapped into people’s fears about the
effects of violent role models on children’s behaviour.
Social Learning Theory
•Bandura’s Bobo Doll
experiment
•Modeling of aggressive
behavior
boys
girls
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
model
rewarded
model
punished
Characteristics of models
• 1. The degree of similarity between the model
situation and the actual situation
• 2. Identification with the model in question
• 3. Whether the model is successful or not
(vicarious reinforcement)
• 4. The amount of exposure to the model situation
in question.
Learning theory, continued
• Peer Groups
– Norms of reference group (imitation or being
same)
– Expectations for gain (may be acceptance)
direct reward
– Violence is the expected mode of problem
solving in sub-cultures.
– Symbols of violence on media (seen as referent
group behavior)
Cross-Cultural studies
• Adults who pressure children:
– To be highly self-reliant
– Extreme high achievers
– Children exhibit high levels of anxiety
whenever they fail to be self-reliant/high
achievers
– Exclusive mother/son sleeping arrangements
(absence of father from room for prolonged
periods of over one year…
Frustration
• Interference with ongoing goal directed
activity or violation of an individuals
expectations
• Early theories: (Spense-Hull)
– Aggression is the naturally dominant response
to frustration
– Frustration is an antecedent of aggression
Frustration
Frustration increases motivation or energy
level of the individual.
As frustration increases the individual uses
more vigorous behaviors to end frustration.
These behaviors become fixed in habit
repertoire and are elicited by similar
stimulus situations.
Thus, responses to motivation state
engendered by frustration depends upon
stimulus and past learning.
Outcome of frustration
– High risk of violence when two groups are
pursuing one goal that only one can possess.
(war, gang fighting)
Instigating Stimuli
• Stimuli Conductive to Violence
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Precipitation event
A low expectancy of punishment
Ready availability of means (weapons)
Alcohol intoxification (drugs also)
Strong Obedience to Authority (Stanley Milgrom)
Boredom/temperature
Group contagion
Mob violence
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Social conditions (overcrowding)
Conflict among group norms or violence
scapegoating
evil motives (implications)
lack of leadership
Poor communication
Low expectation of punishment
absence of social control
Modeling of parents
• Kaj Bjorkqvist
• Parental influcence on aggressiveness can
be explained by two mechanisms
– an emotionally frustrating home atmosphere
– modeling
family study of aggression
• Four age groups of adolescents (11, 13, 15 & 17)
• Groups took the Anger Scale (this scale was designed
to investigate modeling process in aggressive
behavior).
• Three versions of the scale
– father, mother and self
• “what does you mother (or father or self) do when she/he/you get
angry?”
– Study looked at modeling effects of mother with that of
father on adolescents of both sexes, in two types of
environment: at home and with peers.
Conclusion of family study
• 1. Regardless of sex, adolescents tend to imitate
mothers more when angry with peers, while the
impact of fathers is greater when they are angry at
home.
• 2. Modeling effect of the same-sex parent is
relatively stronger than the effect of the parent of
the other sex.
• 3. Mothers have a greater impact than fathers.
(this may be confounded with amount of
exposure)
Conclusions, cont.
• Adolescent boys imitate the aggressive behavior
of their fathers more than that of mothers at home
while they imitate their mothers anger with peers.
• Adolescent girls on the other hand, imitate their
fathers and mothers equally when angry at home,
while with peers they imitate mother more.