Developmental psychology.pdf

318 Motivation and Emotion
Figure 12.3
Work and Recognition. Here a
supervisor inspects a worker's
results. The Hawthorne effect, giving
recognition to the worker, has been
so influential in some factory settings
that it has actually disrupted
progress. Workers receiving special
attention far outstripped control
subjects, resulting in dissatisfaction
among many employees.
Problem of Aggression
American society today is also an aggressive society. Football, our national pastime in
many respects, is not just a contact sport but collision sport. Our theatre and television
include innumerable cowboy shoot-outs, war stories, and murder mysteries. In many
parts of the country there has been a steady increase in criminal behavior. Aggravated
assault occurs most commonly within the family, and approximately 50 percent of the
instances involve spouses killing one another (Uniform Crime Reports, 1982).
Aggression was a recurrent problem for Dawn. Family relationships, she said,
were "always a battle." Her parents lived in bitterness on separate floors at opposite
ends of the house. Dawn had inevitable conflicts with her brother, and one of her early
boyfriends frightened her because she saw in him a "tremendous capacity for violence."
Matters were little better for Stephen. A member of a religious minority group,
he became a target for insults and injuries. At school he was goaded into fights, ridiculed
with harsh jokes, and given a derisive nickname.
Aggression Among Animals This problem is so extremely prevalent that some
scientists today believe the human inclination to aggression is innate, a condition of
our inheritance. These investigators generally approach this question from backgrounds
in ethology and animal behavior, noting the aggressiveness in the animal kingdom. The
hawk swoops over its victim; iguanas butt heads; the howler monkey subjugates by
deafening vocalizations; spiders, bees, and preying mantes eat their own kind. Animals
fight for these reasons: to obtain food or a mate, to establish a territory, and to gain a
position in a social hierarchy (Johnson, 1972). Human beings, it is claimed, have all
of these concerns. Territorial rights, for example, have been a chief object of warfare
throughout human history (Lorenz, 1963; Morris, 1967).
Experimental studies show that animals also can be prompted to pain-induced
aggression, in which they become assaultive immediately after receiving painful stimulation.
The mouse, cat, monkey, snake, turtle, and other species all behave in this
way, attacking any available object or animal, regardless of its role in the situation.
They do so even when they have been coexisting peacefully with the other animal prior
to the stimulus (Azrin, 1967).
This puzzling phenomenon appears at first to involve displaced aggression, but
it can be interpreted in another light. Trapped in a painful situation, the animal may
be simply doing its best to defend itself against a mysterious attack. The aggression
in this case may be a form of self-preservation.