Sociology 3701: Outline--Week 13

I. Human aggression.

A. Defn: intentional behavior aimed at causing either physical or psychological pain

1. Hostile aggression: motivated by anger and desire to inflict pain

2. Instrumental aggression: as a means to some other end

These are what have called ideal types, meaning abstractions from reality, simplifications; in real life, the two are often intermixed. The abusive husband, for example, is probably using both these kinds of aggression at once.

B. Are humans by nature aggressive?

1. Cross cultural evidence showing wide variability. Are there societies with no aggression at all? Probably not, especially given the inclusion of psychological pain in the definition. E.g. Colin Turnbull: The Forest People

2. Kessen: Childhood in China. Young children, 2-5, showing much less aggression than in the United States and their parents, grandparents, teachers, etc. not expecting that children of that age will be aggressive (on the other hand, a great deal of aggression in the "Cultural Revolution" initiated by Mao Zedong in 1966.

C. Catharsis vs rationalization (self-justification)

1. Can the release of aggression, either in a controlled situation (such as a sport) or in art or fantasy, be beneficial, in the sense of reducing the tendency to aggression in ordinary life? Parents talk about letting children fight in terms of "getting it out of their system." The ancient Greeks looked at drama as an opportunity for catharsis, the release of emotion. Aronson cites a wide variety of evidence showing that aggression breeds more aggression.

a. Patterson study of high school football players, a week before the season begins and a week after. Significantly more aggressive a week after.

b. Russell: spectators at a violent hockey match. Generates increasing hostility.

c. Feshbach. Students who have been insulted by their instructor. Those with a chance to write about it slightly less aggressive.

2. Why doesn't catharsis work with aggression? Cognitive dissonance theory again.
If we, who are good decent people, mistreat someone (or a group of someones), they must be pretty awful to deserve such treatment. Notice the implications for everything from junior high children picking on "sissies" and "fags" to race relations to war.

D. Frustration leads to aggression, especially when:

1. A goal is palpable and drawing near

2. Expectations are high

3. When the goal is blocked "unjustifiably"

Attribution theory again. You beliefs about the intention of the person who hurts or frustrates you make a large difference in how you react.

Deindividuation. If you can't distinguish your "victim" as an individual, you are apt to be much more aggressive.

E. Mass media and aggression.

1. Aronson cites a recent study in which 58% of television programs contain violence, and of those, 78% of the time it is without remorse, criticism, or penalty.

2. Strong experimental evidence showing that watching violence does increase the frequency of aggressive behavior in children. This seems to work in terms of several different mechanisms:

a. If they can do it, so can I.... weakening of previously learned inhibitions.

b. Imitation. Ideas about how to be violent.

c. Labeling our feelings. "I must be angry."

F. A great many of these factors that come together in war situations, whether the American Civil War, the war on drugs, or the war on terror.

1. The raid on Lawrence, Kansas, by Quantrill's raiders during the Civil War: 183 men and boys killed, less than 20 of them soldiers, leaving behind 80 widows and 250 motherless children.

New York Daily Times: "In the history of the war thus far, full as it has been of dreadful scenes, there has been no such diabolical work as this indiscriminate slaughter of peaceful villagers."

Richmond Examine: "The expedition to Lawrence was a gallant and perfectly fair blow at the enemy... as the population of Kansas is malignant and scoundrely beyond description."

In the aftermath, federal troops drove out every man, woman, and child living in three Missouri border counties, while Jayhawkers burned and looted their homes and raided the refugee columns, "stealing even wedding rings."

2. World War II and the internship of Japanese and Japanese-Americans who were living on the west coast.

a. Japanese (or any Asian) immigrants not allowed to become citizens and therefore they remained "aliens." A short step to "enemy aliens."

b. Video: "Family Gathering" VC2244

II. The Social Psychology of Prejudice

A. Prejudice, Aronson's dfn: "a hostile or negative attitude toward a distinguishable group based on generalizations from faulty or incomplete"

B. Theories about the sources of prejudice

1. Attraction and comfort level for "people like us"... an extension of ethnocentrism, which is pretty much universal in human societies

2. Displaced aggression (scapegoating)... e.g. the Nazi hatred of the Jews in the face of Germany's severe economic troubles in the 1920s and 1930s

3. The prejudiced personality. Adorno et al: The Authoritarian Personality

4. Social learning and conformity. Van den Berghe's account of the way newcomers to the Belgian Congo learned prejudice in their voyage on the Tervaete. Dollard: Class and Caste in a Southern Town.

5. Cognitive processes. Allport on the "normality of prejudgment" An extension of attribution and cognitive dissonance processes we have already studied.

6. Conflict and competition: what Max Weber called strategies of monopolization by status groups

a. The Sherifs' research with the Rattlers and the Eagles, two groups that were created at a summer camp for boys..brought to the point of dramatic conflict and even hatred simply by engaging in a tournament of games and manipulating them to see the other group as greedy and selfish. Boys who had identified each other as best friends in the pre-camp survey eventually having nothing to do with each other. "Our hypothesis is that when two groups have conflicting aims... their members will become hostile even though the groups are composed of normal, well-adjusted individuals." (Betsy's basketball team)

b. Exacerbated by the perception of dwindling opportunities. E.g. the anti-immigrant fervor which often accompanies a severe decline in the economy. The illegal deportations of Mexican-Americans during the Great Depression.

c. We can probably make the same distinction as Aronson made about the two types of aggression. Prejudice and discrimination as an expression of hatred, vs prejudice and discrimination as a means to an end (more privilege for your group).

e.g. NPR show about German women who were not initially sympatethic to anti-Semitism, until someone pointed out how many businesses were owned by Jews: "Why should they have it all without work. It was time we had something."

d. Emotion may well follow advantage. Frederick Douglass's account of his new mistress.

Sociology 3701: Outline--Week 13

I. Human aggression.

A. Defn: intentional behavior aimed at causing either physical or psychological pain

1. Hostile aggression: motivated by anger and desire to inflict pain

2. Instrumental aggression: as a means to some other end

These are what have called ideal types, meaning abstractions from reality, simplifications; in real life, the two are often intermixed. The abusive husband, for example, is probably using both these kinds of aggression at once.

B. Are humans by nature aggressive?

1. Cross cultural evidence showing wide variability. Are there societies with no aggression at all? Probably not, especially given the inclusion of psychological pain in the definition. E.g. Colin Turnbull: The Forest People

C. Catharsis vs rationalization (self-justification)

a. Patterson study of high school football players, a week before the season begins and a week after. Significantly more aggressive a week after.

b. Russell: spectators at a violent hockey match. Generates increasing hostility.

c. Feshbach. Students who have been insulted by their instructor. Those with a chance to write about it slightly less aggressive.

D. Frustration leads to aggression, especially when:

1. A goal is palpable and drawing near

2. Expectations are high

3. When the goal is blocked "unjustifiably"

Attribution theory again. You beliefs about the intention of the person who hurts or frustrates you make a large difference in how you react.

Deindividuation. If you can't distinguish your "victim" as an individual, you are apt to be much more aggressive.

E. Mass media and aggression.

1. Aronson cites a recent study in which 58% of television programs contain violence, and of those, 78% of the time it is without remorse, criticism, or penalty.

2. Strong experimental evidence showing that watching violence does increase the frequency of aggressive behavior in children. This seems to work in terms of several different mechanisms:

a. If they can do it, so can I.... weakening of previously learned inhibitions.

b. Imitation. Ideas about how to be violent.

c. Labeling our feelings. "I must be angry."

F. A great many of these factors that come together in war situations, whether the American Civil War, the war on drugs, or the war on terror.

1. The raid on Lawrence, Kansas, by Quantrill's raiders during the Civil War: 183 men and boys killed, less than 20 of them soldiers, leaving behind 80 widows and 250 motherless children.

New York Daily Times: "In the history of the war thus far, full as it has been of dreadful scenes, there has been no such diabolical work as this indiscriminate slaughter of peaceful villagers."

Richmond Examine: "The expedition to Lawrence was a gallant and perfectly fair blow at the enemy... as the population of Kansas is malignant and scoundrely beyond description."

In the aftermath, federal troops drove out every man, woman, and child living in three Missouri border counties, while Jayhawkers burned and looted their homes and raided the refugee columns, "stealing even wedding rings."

2. World War II and the internship of Japanese and Japanese-Americans who were living on the west coast.

a. Japanese (or any Asian) immigrants not allowed to become citizens and therefore they remained "aliens." A short step to "enemy aliens."

b. Video: "Family Gathering" VC2244

II. The Social Psychology of Prejudice

A. Prejudice, Aronson's dfn: "a hostile or negative attitude toward a distinguishable group based on generalizations from faulty or incomplete"

B. Theories about the sources of prejudice

1. Attraction and comfort level for "people like us"... an extension of ethnocentrism, which is pretty much universal in human societies

2. Displaced aggression (scapegoating)... e.g. the Nazi hatred of the Jews in the face of Germany's severe economic troubles in the 1920s and 1930s

3. The prejudiced personality. Adorno et al: The Authoritarian Personality

4. Social learning and conformity. Van den Berghe's account of the way newcomers to the Belgian Congo learned prejudice in their voyage on the Tervaete. Dollard: Class and Caste in a Southern Town.

5. Cognitive processes. Allport on the "normality of prejudgment" An extension of attribution and cognitive dissonance processes we have already studied.

6. Conflict and competition: what Max Weber called strategies of monopolization by status groups

b. Exacerbated by the perception of dwindling opportunities. E.g. the anti-immigrant fervor which often accompanies a severe decline in the economy. The illegal deportations of Mexican-Americans during the Great Depression.

c. We can probably make the same distinction as Aronson made about the two types of aggression. Prejudice and discrimination as an expression of hatred, vs prejudice and discrimination as a means to an end (more privilege for your group).

e.g. NPR show about German women who were not initially sympatethic to anti-Semitism, until someone pointed out how many businesses were owned by Jews: "Why should they have it all without work. It was time we had something."

d. Emotion may well follow advantage. Frederick Douglass's account of his new mistress.

C. Exercise: Stratification and Prejudice in School

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