13D

1. SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPLANATIONS OF
AGGRESSION
• 1st theory = Social Learning Theory
• 2nd theory = Deindividuation Theory
• “ ”

2. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY - AO1
• Bandura (founder)
• Reinforcement (direct vs. vicarious)
• Role Model
• Imitation
• Modelling
• Punishment
• Likelihood of repeating behaviour
• Example in aggression (bullying)
• Learn
• Observe

3. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY - AO2
•  Bandura (1963) – children will imitate aggressive behaviour
•  Bandura (1965) – children are likely to imitate aggressive behaviour
especially when they observe the role model receiving a reward
•  Bandura (1965) – Live clown – children will behave aggressively
regardless of how artificial the setting is
•  Philips (1983) – US homicide rates increase following boxing match

4. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY - A03
• Gender
• Reductionist
• Ethical Guidelines?
• Nature vs. Nurture
• Animal Studies
• Determinsm vs. Free Will
• Ethnocentricism

5. DEINDIVIDUATION THEORY - AO1
• Le Bon, ‘Group Mind’
• Festinger ‘Deindividuation’
• Reduced Inhibitions
• Public self awareness
• Anonymity
• Crowds
• Zimbardo
• Uniform / concealed identity
• Deiner
• Reduced ability to monitor one’s
behaviour

6. DEINDIVIDUATION THEORY - AO2
•  Watson (1974) - war paint = greater levels of violence in wars
•  Mann (1981) – Suidide chanting when dark, big crowd and large
distance
•  Diener (1976) – Halloween trick-or-treaters more likely to steal when
anonymous (identity concealed, in group, responsibility shifted)
•  Zimbardo (1971) – Prisoners wore uniform & reflective glasses and
behaved aggressively
•  Gergen (1973) – dark room caused ppts to feel aroused not violent…

7. SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY - A03
• Gender
• Reductionist
• Ethical Guidelines?
• Nature vs. Nurture
• Animal Studies
• Determinsm vs. Free Will
• Ethnocentricism
Postmes & Spears … not all
crowds are aggressive
(Theory is reductionist) there
must be other factors

8. INSTITUTIONAL
AGGRESSION
SITUATIONAL VS. DISPOSITIONAL FACTORS OF INSTITUTIONAL AGGRESSION

9. AGGRESSION
• ‘The intent to harm someone through verbal or
physical actions’

10. INSTITUTIONAL AGGRESSION

11. INSTITUTION…
• An organisation with its own social roles where
behaviour is restricted and under the control of
authority

12. INSTITUTIONAL AGGRESSION
• Aggressive behaviour that occurs within an institution,
motivated by social forces

13. PRISON VIOLENCE…
• In the UK, there were 88 self-inflicted deaths in prison last year
• Data shows that serious assaults amongst inmates reached 11,661 last
year
• 3,201 assaults were committed against guards last year
• Overcrowding prisons have reached an all time high
• The Conservative government have planned to implement budget cuts
for prisons of up to 24% over the next 3 years

14. PRISON VIOLENCE

15. THE INSTITUTIONAL AGGRESSION DEBATE
• Is prison violence present due to the violent people that
are put in there? (importation of violence)
• OR
• Is prison violence a consequence of the prison
environment itself? (situational factors?)

16. ZIMBARDO (1971) STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT
• Zimbardo devised the SPE
following the Attica prison riots in
New York.
• He wanted to see whether
institutional aggression is as a
result of situational factors of the
prison itself or of ‘dispositional’
factors of the people you put in it

18. ZIMBARDO (1971) STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT
• All participants in the SPE were put through rigorous screening
before being accepted for the position
• All ppts were considered ‘normal’
• The roles were distributed randomly across the sample.

19. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT…
• Read the transcript in conversation on pg. 124-125
• Guard Hellmann was one of the most brutal of the guards.
• He is from a middle-class background
• He was a musician
• Described as having ‘great love for fellow human beings’

20. SITUATIONAL DEBATE
• Situational Factors are those present in the social situation
that may influence aggressive behaviour

21. DEPRIVATION HYPOTHESIS
• Expands on the situational debate and states that
aggression arises as a result of being deprived of certain
rights…

22. SITUATIONAL FACTORS…
• Over crowding
• Boredom
• Petty Rules
• Loss of Privacy
• Oppressive Regime
• Loss of Freedom

23. SITUATIONAL DEBATE
• The situational argument explains aggressive behaviour in
institutions as a result of the environment of the
institution itself.
• Because of this, it states that everybody when put into the
correct context has the potential to behave anti-socially

24. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT... ABU GHRAIB
• In 2003, an Iraqi torture camp was exposed in the media after
photos of violence and humiliation were leaked

25. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… ABU GHRAIB
• Who’s to blame?
• Are the American military involved in the camp inherently evil?
• Or did the context of the military and prison institution influence
their aggressive behaviour?
• Zimbardo provided an expert witness during the trials of the
American soldiers, arguing that their behaviour was a result of the
situation which led good soldiers to do bad things…

26. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT #1…
• Status & Power
The guards involved in Abu Ghraib were army reservists and ‘bottom
of the barrel’. They had little control over their duties and were
made to work night shifts. They asserted their power over the
prisoners instead.
Superior guards rarely made checks during these shifts.

27. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT #2…
• Revenge & Retaliation
Prisoners were ‘tarred with the same brush’ as the terrorists who
had been at war with American soldiers.
Humiliation was used to teach them a lesson

28. SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT #3…
• Deindividuation & Helplessness…
The behaviour was in automatic response to the expected
authoritative role and the prison environment.
It was not pre-meditated.

29. • “…Instead of embracing the moral high ground that
distances us good folks from the bad ones and gives
short shrift to analysis of causal factors in that
situation the situational approach gives those
‘others’ the benefit of attributional charity”

31. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Bernard (1992) suggests police violence is
as a result of their working environment…

32. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Bernard (1992)
• Chronic Stress
• Inability to respond to actual sources of that stress
• Lack of Social support
• Cynicism
• Bernard (1992) argued that all of these factors add to generate negative
affective states that may (in the absence of coping strategies) lead to
violent behaviour

33. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Research into “Hazing”

34. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Research into “Hazing”
Initiation rituals are particularly harsh in high discipline jobs/sports
• ‘Normal’ individuals behave anti-socially towards new recruits
• ‘Real man’ Hypothesis – “I got through it”

35. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Archer (1999)
• Examined institutional aggression in initation
ceremonies within the US fire department
• Harsh treatment was seen as tradition not acts of
hostility. Institutional aggression may have other
factors

36. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Research into bullying at schools…
• Do schools which have bullying problems have them because of the
differences in academic environments or because they have a higher
rate of aggressive individuals?

37. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Twemlow (1996)
• Schools with bullying problems have the same number of anti-social
students…
• But the schools with problems are ones in which the aggressive, bully
role models dominate.
• Making the non-bullies the dominant role models significantly
changes the behaviour of the school as a whole

38. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Twemlow (1996)
• Supports SLT ?
• Aggressive behaviour in schools is as a result of the social structure
within the institution … not the individuals in it.

39. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  The situationist approach holds a very negative view of
humanity.
• It suggests all humans would behave aggressively under the
right circumstances

40. EVALUATION OF THE SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT… (A02)
•  Fails to explain why not all members of an institution will
behave aggressively…
• There must be other factors affecting individual differences
of aggression…

41. EVALUATION OF SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT … AO3
Gender
Reductionist
Ethical Guidelines?
Nature vs. Nurture
Animal Studies
Determinsm vs. Free Will
Ethnocentricism

42. EXAM PREP…
• Imagine you’re writing the final paragraph of your 20 mark essay.
Try and write a short paragraph incorporating all 3 A03 points (R, N
& D) for evaluation of the situation argument for Institutional
Aggression
• Outline one explanation of Institutional Aggression
(4 marks)

43. A03 SITUATIONAL ARGUMENT
• The situational argument of institutional aggression removes any element of
free will as it states that we are all capable of aggressive behaviour if put into
the correct circumstance with certain situational factors present. The
argument is therefore deterministic and creates a negative view of human
nature being capable of despicable acts given the correct scenario. The
situational argument could be argued to be reductionist as it fails to explain
why not all members within an institution behaves aggressively when
presented with the same situational factors (i.e. within a prison). It largely
focuses on the environment and fails to account for dispositional factors such
as biological differences or differences within the individuals’ personalities
which may predispose them to aggressive behaviour.