Social-Psychological explanations : FA hypothesis

• Frustration-Aggression Hypothesis


  Developed by Dollard et al in 1939

  • Suggested that frustration always leads to aggression, and aggression is always the result of frustration
  • Aggression is viewed as a psychological drive, cause by frustration = what we feel when our attempt to achieve a goal is blocked by an external factor
  • Based on the psychodynamic concept of catharsis
• Displacement


  Sometimes we cannot directly express our aggression against the source of frustration, because it may be abstract, powerful, unavailable or risk having punishment.

  Instead aggression is displaced onto an alternative (weaker).
• Research


  Geen gave male uni students a puzzle to complete. He manipulated the frustration level in 3 ways:

  • Impossible to solve
  • Interfering confederate so ran out of time
  • Insulting confederate as they failed to solve puzzle.

  The students then gave electric shocks to the confederate when they made a mistake on another task.

  Found that the insulted participants gave the strongest shocks on average, followed by interfered group then impossible task. All gave more shocks than control group.
• Weapon Effect


  Berkowitz - the presence of aggressive cues in the environment make behaviour more likely

  Berkowitz and LePage =

  • Participants were angered by a confederate, then sat at a table that had either a gun or tennis racquet on it that the researcher said they forgot to put away. Participant told to give electric shock to the confederate, with participants who saw the guns being more aggressive than the ones who saw the tennis racquet.
• Eval : Strength


  There are real-world applications for the FA hypothesis, one being that the significance of environmental cues featured in a gun control debate in the USA. It is argued that the open presence of a weapon and aggression can make its use more likely, and so governments and people can put things in place to prevent this.
• Eval : Weakness


  Frustration does not always lead to aggression, as there is a range of responses to frustration e.g. despair, anxiety or determination. Also, frustration is only one stimuli that creates a negative feeling, so aggressive behaviour may be triggered by negative feelings in general.
• Eval : Weakness


  It can be argued that there is gender bias in research, as with Geen's study all participants were male. This doesn't tell us how females may react similarly or differently with the FA hypothesis.