the frustration-aggression hypothesis

• The frustration-aggression hypothesis was proposed by Dollard et al 1939 and suggests that aggression is a result of environmental factors and all aggression is caused by frustration.
• Frustration is the negative feeling people experience when they are blocked from achieving their goals.
• when a person behaves aggressively, they experience catharsis and their negative feelings go away.
• The frustration-aggression hypothesis suggests we direct our aggression towards someone or something else if we can’t direct our aggression at the person or thing that caused frustration. This is called displacement.
• The closer we are to the goal, the more likely we are to behave aggressively if our goal is blocked.
• The more effective aggression is for helping us reach a goal, the more likely we are to behave aggressively
• People are less likely to be aggressive if the frustrating situation blocking their goal is justified.
• Supporting evidence for frustration-aggression hypothesis. Pastore tested the effect of justifiability on aggression by giving hypothetical scenarios to participants and found participants would feel significantly less aggressive if a scenario was justified than if it were unjustified. This is positive as it supports the theory that justifiability has an effect on aggression as proposed under the frustration-aggression hypothesis.
• Frustration-aggression hypothesis can be applied to real-world scenarios. Priks found that Swedish football fans display more aggression when their team is performing worse than expected. This is positive as the frustration-aggression hypothesis has high ecological validity and can be used to understand real aggressive behaviour.
• Lack of research support. Bushman et al 2002 made participants angry by giving them negative feedback on a piece of work and encouraged them to punch a bag and found expressing aggression leads to more anger, rather than catharsis. This is problematic as Bushman's research contradicts the frustration-aggression hypothesis.
• Frustration-aggression hypothesis can't explain gender differences. The frustration-aggression hypothesis ignores real differences in aggression between genders. This is problematic as the theory suffers from beta bias.