PSYC104 Lecture 4: Social Motivation
1 Jun 2018
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Week 4 Lecture
Social Motivation:
1) Aggression and violence
• Why do humans hurt one another?
• Aggression is a fundamental social motive (everyone does it sometimes)
Social Learning Accounts: Is this capacity in our genes? Are we born with
aggression etc.?
• The history of thinking about aggression and violence goes back to earliest
evolutionary history when humans could think and reason about themselves
and others behaviours – people were clearly capable of behaving violently and
cruelty
• From 1920s onwards, theorists like Skinner and Watson argued that because
behaviour is all we have, measure and see, we cannot be thinking about
people’s heads, so aggression and violence are purely learnt. Toddler is being
raised within a particular family/culture, children learn to become
aggressive and violent – they are rewarded.
• This idea about learning was applied to the area of aggression and violence –
by modelling, children would learn how to perform aggressively and this in
turn, explains aggression in adulthood.
• BoBo doll experiments: the experiment was to bring children into the
laboratory, they get to watch, through a window, an adult playing with this
BoBo doll. The BoBo doll swings backwards and forwards. The adult was
sometimes beating up the doll, in other conditions there was no aggression at
all. Confirmed hypothesis – children who saw the aggression with adults and
the doll were more likely to go beat up the doll after → this shows that
children learnt how to behave aggresively through the adults/model
• But what comes first?
o Greitemeyer and Mugge (2014): meta-analysis of 98 studies on 37,000
people → this found significant, positive relationship between violent
videogames and aggressive behaviour
There are PROBLEMS in the social accounts of aggression and violence:
• It does not explain the origins of human violence – we are attracted to
violence (sports; boxing, rugby etc.) where does that come from?
• Why have humans behaved aggressively throughout history and across
cultures?
• Why are humans attracted to violence, even though they fear it?
• Is human aggression instinctive or learned, or both?
Instinctive Accounts:
▪ Aggression as instinct –
• Charles Darwin: interested in the notion of continuity
(animals, primates to humans) – believed that
aggression helps survival (fighting/competing to get
find more resources at oneclass.com
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food etc.) i.e. aggressive functions to assert power and
dominance
• Threat (e.g. animals = snarls and aggressive noises) and
appeasement (where the cat/dog on losing end becomes
submissive and demonstrates low behaviours like
crawling – surrendering/turning off aggression) displays
• Freud and Lorenz interested in aggression:
o Freud argued that there was existence in the ‘death’ instinct - tear
down what you have built/what you wanted to achieve.
o Lorenz (an ecologist) wrote a book, “On aggression” (1983) proposed
that we do not necessarily have a death instinct, but we have a fighting
instinct.
▪ He also proposed that aggression is a healthy instinct but needs
appropriate channelling.
▪ Our aggressive energies are building up so we need to provide
them with things such as sporting competition, games etc.
▪ He brought in the notion of catharsis: purifying discharge, gets
rid of aggressive ‘energies’
• Problems with Instinct theories:
o There is no evidence for aggressive energy reservoirs inside people
o Catharsis does not work → violence tends to breed violence
• Current Thinking:
o Aggression and violence involves a complex interaction between
nature (innate propensities – what we come into the world with) and
nurture (what learn from our families and culture – our socialisation)
o But, why are we born with the capacity for violent behaviour? What is
it for?
• Evolutionary Accounts:
o Functions of aggression – what is achieved by behaving aggressively?
o How has aggression worked to enhance the reproductive success of the
human species over thousands of years of evolution?
o NOTE: no morality involved here. Culture teaches us what is right and
wrong, but there are no ‘oughts’ or ‘shoulds’ in nature
• Functions of Aggression:
o Aggression can help you when you do not have resources of your own
– you may be able to co-opt the resources of others.
▪ E.g. pointing guns in grocery shops, bullying in the playground
to get someone’s recess etc.
o Aggression helps us to defend ourselves from attack and protect our
own resources
o Intrasexual Aggression: another function of aggression to inflict costs
of intrasexual rivals
▪ Men are more likely than women to physically hurt or kill their
rivals
▪ Women are more likely to verbally derogate their rivals (put
them down, insult them)
▪ E.g. the bachelor TV show
o Inciting fear in rivals:
▪ Aggression can function to build reputation as a dangerous
person – “If you mess with me, you’ll be sorry!”
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Social motivation: aggression and violence, why do humans hurt one another, aggression is a fundamental social motive (everyone does it sometimes) Toddler is being raised within a particular family/culture, children learn to become aggressive and violent they are rewarded. The adult was sometimes beating up the doll, in other conditions there was no aggression at all. There are problems in the social accounts of aggression and violence: Culture teaches us what is right and wrong, but there are no oughts" or shoulds" in nature: functions of aggression, aggression can help you when you do not have resources of your own. Found that the supporters levels were the same before the match, but after the levels were 25% higher than spectators supporting the team that lost. Theories of altruism: altruism = being the capacity or behaviour where you act in a service of another without necessarily benefiting yourself.
