Social psychological explanations of aggression

• The Frustration-Aggression Hypothesis:

  • Developed by Dollard et al (1939)
  • Says that aggression is caused by frustration in a cause-effect relationship.
  • Frustration is 'any event or stimulus that prevents an individual from attaining some goal'.
  • Aggression is the inevitable result of this frustration because it provides the 'release'- aggression is cathartic (emotional relief).
• Frustration is at its highest when:

  • Motivation to achieve a goal is high
  • We are expecting gratification
  • We have no control over it
• • Aggression cannot always be directed at the source of aggression; it may be abstract.
  • So, it may get redirected & we take out the aggression on someone else.
  • Aggression could be inherited by other factors, such as threats of punishment.
• Drive to goal -> Obstacle to goal -> Frustration -> Aggression -> EITHER Success (->Catharsis) OR Punishment (-> Frustration).
• Real world applications- support:

  • Sports violence- Priks studied sports crowd violence & found that crowds were more aggressive when their teams performed worse than expected, supporting the idea of frustration resulting from the three main aspects of the model leading to aggression.
• Real world applications- support:

  • Mass killings- following the 1st World War, many Germans blamed/ scapegoated Jews for the economic & social difficulties that followed the loss of the war.
  • This lead to mass killing under Hitler's regime & WW2, driven by the frustration of the consequences of WW1 and the scapegoating & propaganda of the government.
• Evaluation for the frustration-aggression hypothesis- weakness:

  • Major flaw to the theory is that frustration can occur without any aggression displayed.
  • Behavioural psychologists claim that frustration only leads to anger & that for aggression to actually be displayed, some form of learning needs to have occurred- either classical or operant conditioning where an association/ reward has been previously present for the aggressive act, or through observing others rewarded for aggressive acts.
  • Ie, social learning suggests aggression is not solely driven by frustration, but via learning that aggression in response to frustration leads to a successful outcome- this explains why it is not always displayed in response to frustration.
• Evaluation for the frustration-aggression hypothesis- weakness:

  • Flaw is that not all aggression is as a result of frustration; aggression is known to result from a number of adverse situations such as pain, heat etc.
  • For example, research has demonstrated that on hotter days, the pitchers in a baseball match were more likely to direct their pitch towards the batter's head.
  • Therefore, not all instances of aggression can be attributed to frustration.