Why is a person aggressive and cruel. What is aggression in psychology

Aggression is a dangerous form of behavior. This is a huge, destructive force. At least that's what they're used to thinking. However, aggression can be used to your advantage and directed towards achieving success, overcoming obstacles. But more often it really happens the other way around: aggression uses a person.

We encounter aggression at almost every step: aggressive and rude people in transport or a store, “skirmishes” at school or work. If we ourselves are not participants in situations, then we become unwitting witnesses.

Why do people show aggression? They protect themselves. Z. Freud believed that a person destroys everything around in order not to destroy himself. That is, the causes of aggression are internal in nature, but first things first.

Aggression is any form of behavior aimed at insulting or harming another living being who does not want such treatment. Aggression is a form with a pronounced emotional coloring. With aggressive behavior, a person is motivated to harm (moral or physical) or capture another person (s).

In psychology, there are several approaches to the study of the problem of aggression:

Aggression is based on natural, innate instincts.
Aggressive behavior becomes under the influence of biological factors (hormones and mental disorders).
Aggression is induced by external motives of the individual (social factors, environmental influences).
Aggression is the result of a person's learning through someone else's and his own experience, an example.
The basis of aggression is a complex interaction of cognitive processes (attention, imagination, etc.) and previous human experience.

In animals, aggression is a defensive reaction. The same foundations are noted in human psychology. Aggression is a sign of weakness, insecurity, defenselessness.

Without training, human socialization, aggression remains an animal instinct. Why we can conclude that it is characteristic of immature, maladaptive personalities.

Aggression begins with the irritation that comes when we feel that someone has encroached on our safety, personal space, physical or mental "I".

Causes of aggression in children

In children, even at a very young age, there are two forms of aggression: non-destructive and innate destructiveness:

Non-destructive aggression is a form of defensive behavior aimed at achieving a goal, self-assertion, gaining experience.
Congenital destructiveness - malicious and dangerous behavior for others. Interestingly, inborn destructiveness does not appear immediately after birth, unlike non-destructive aggression. Innate behavior is activated after severe stress or pain.

The main reason for aggression in children is an example from the environment. Neither games nor movies have such an impact. Violence against the child is especially destructive. Those who have experienced violence and aggression become aggressive towards others.

Causes of aggression in adolescents and adults

Causes of aggression in adults include:

aggression in the family;
the nature of relationships with peers.

The negative impact of punishment on a child has been scientifically proven. Parental punishment is fraught with the following dangers:

an example of aggression;
avoiding or resisting parents;
punishment that is too emotional for the child will eventually remain in memory as causeless;
a child, under pain of punishment, can change his behavior, but these norms are unlikely to become his inner convictions.

Social factors also contribute:

obstacles to satisfaction that cause frustration;
provocations from outside;
promotion of cruelty and violence in the media;
increased excitement and unrest in society;
excessive emotionality of a person, which makes it difficult to make adequate decisions and predict the results.

As I said, by and large, we can assume that a person is aggressive towards himself. But sometimes such dissatisfaction with oneself pours out on others. Especially on those who, in the opinion of the aggressor, are guilty of his failure.

Types of aggression

There are 5 types of aggression:

physical (direct infliction of moral or physical harm);
verbal (verbal aggression);
expressive (expression through non-verbal means);
indirect (directed and undirected aggression towards not the true object of irritation, but more accessible);
direct (impact on the object of irritation);
irritation (willingness to show aggression);
negativism (opposition, passive resistance before active struggle).

There are other classifications of aggression. In general, they can be represented through a description of the key properties of aggression around which the classifications are built:

orientation (on oneself, on an object, on a living object);
observability (hidden or open aggression);
measure of severity (frequency, duration);
manifestation space (house, street);
the nature of mental actions (physical, in dreams, in words);
on social danger (legally punishable or non-punishable aggressive actions).

In addition, aggression can be individual or collective. Hatred, envy, resentment is also a variant of aggression.

Also, aggression can be directed at the outside world (heteroaggression) or at, that is, the person himself (autoaggression). Depending on the cause of the appearance, aggression can be reactive (a response to irritation from a quarrel,) and spontaneous (unexpected outbursts as a result of mental problems or the cumulative effect of patience). In terms of direction, aggression can be targeted (causing harm) or instrumental (winning competitions, the work of a physician).

Psychological aggression

Separately, I want to consider psychological aggression as the most popular type. It includes:

imposing goods, services, someone's society, beliefs on us;
unsolicited advice;
shifting responsibility;
intimidation;
addiction formation;
emotional deprivation;
slander;
inducing feelings of guilt;
infringement of self-esteem;
compulsion;
unfair demands;
importunate requests;
insults and rudeness.

Sometimes the true goal is not realized even by the aggressor himself. And often this goal is self-affirmation, coercion. For example, the same aggression in order to influence, to achieve one's own.

Forms of aggression

The forms of aggression include rage, irritation, anger, hatred.

Rage is an affective state that is as close as possible to aggression. Aggression without rage is impossible.
Irritation is a weak manifestation of aggression, a signal of its potential.
Anger is a more intense feeling than irritation, but more private. The object of anger is always more clearly expressed in nature and content.
Hatred is the heaviest manifestation of aggression. More often it is a character trait, it quickly becomes chronic and takes root.

Correction of aggressive behavior

In psychology, there is the concept of "socialization of aggression." This implies the conscious subjugation of aggression to oneself, gaining control over it, the expression of aggression in forms that are permissible and acceptable in a particular society. The success of the socialization of aggression is influenced by the model (example) and reinforcement (praise, encouragement).

To correct aggression, you need to consciously treat the world and yourself, see cause-and-effect relationships and be able to control situations, know your capabilities. Working on yourself is not easy. But you can overcome aggression if you really want it.

Take control of your life. If you are confident in yourself, you will know that the result depends only on you, then you will be able to adequately respond to difficulties.
Determine why you are angry or annoyed. Which of your needs is not being met? How can you solve this problem?
Think: why are you aggressive? What do you want to achieve with this? What other ways can you get what you want?
Find . You must have a clear life plan, motives. Then there will simply be no time, no strength, no desire for aggression.
Learn to express anger in socially acceptable ways.
Master the techniques.
If you can’t cope with aggression yourself, ask your loved ones for help, contact a specialist.
Do not look for the guilty, do not console yourself with hopes and expectations. Take full responsibility for your own life.
Forgive and forget.
Practice and more practice. Regularly repeat the mastered techniques of self-regulation, reflect on your behavior and its results, put into practice alternative ways to achieve the goal.
Developed self-knowledge and an adequate perception of the world is the key to mental balance.

Aggression is only justified if it is the only way to keep yourself safe. If aggression is a way of getting pleasure, then we are talking about a destructive, abnormal feeling that needs to be disposed of.

Most people are unloved. Neither in childhood nor in adulthood, many of us received the love that forms the foundation harmonious relationship with oneself and with the world. There are two energies. Energy of love and the energy of fear. Everything else is the varieties that make up these energies. And when missing love, turns on fear. And exactly fear provokes aggression, claims, paranoia. The unconscious mechanism turns on as follows - the tension of the outside world starts fear, fear includes internal protection in the form of aggression, dissatisfaction with life leads to addictions (alcohol, for example), this in turn exacerbates internal contradictions and enhances the pathological perception of oneself and the world. And thus the person commits uncontrollable, inadequate actions. The psyche seems to explode from the accumulated tension. In this "cold" time, natural, natural relationship, emotions.

Love yourself, start appreciating and respecting yourself. And then there is the need to share it with others.

Love, it is amazingly arranged. The more you give, the more you have left. And then life begins to line up according to other laws. Not from the scarcity of everything and the needs of it, but from abundance. And then abundance comes into your life.

I want to give an example of an amazing person: an old man, hieromonk, Father Sevostyan, from the Yenisei monastery he was sent to serve in the outback, the taiga, where there is a small temple, a little church. You can get there only in winter along the winter road, which was laid for timber trucks. And in the summer by helicopter. This is an amazing person. Embodiment of Divine love. He speaks in very simple words, but he says it in such a way that every word hits the heart. In this Temple, everything is free, candles, notes, for which Father Sevostyan prays. And everything is there: a bell tower, an equipped Temple, rare icons. The lamps there never go out, they burn day and night. So Father Sevostyan preserves the blessed fire from Jerusalem.

When I heard the ringing of bells in this outback, in the taiga, in the forest, it seemed to me that angels had descended from heaven, it was so beautiful. When Father Sevostyan escorts you on your way back, he gives you fruits for the journey: apples, grapes, pineapple, pies, and carefully asks: "Do you have everything?" And he does not have a sales department, management and other management structures. But he has an amazing power of love that can create. Numerous parcels from different cities are flowing to this locality, where even electricity is turned on by the hour. And this amazing person lives from the state love and abundance, and not out of selfishness and fear a. And for everyone, he will find exactly those words that he needs at the moment, which will help him solve his problems and become better. And in conclusion of my emotional text, I would like to quote the words of Father Sevostyan - "There is no reason for you to be upset, let alone despair."

An aggressive person is a real problem for others.

Thoughtless offensive words or an awkward movement can infuriate an interlocutor, neighbor, wife or husband, who becomes dangerous both for himself and for the people around him. An aggressive person can commit a crime that he will regret for the rest of his life. Why can't we always control our rage attacks? How to painlessly get rid of anger?

Why does a person become aggressive?

Each person has his own boiling point, in a few seconds the most balanced personalities can turn into reckless people if a sense of danger arises. Not only the personal qualities of a person affect the level of aggressiveness, the hormonal cocktail presented by nature has no less impact on this level.

Researchers in the field of the human psyche have concluded that the causes of aggressive human behavior are fluctuations in the levels of the following hormones:

Adrenalin;

norepinephrine;

Testosterone.

Adrenaline starts the rescue program, not everyone is endowed with norepinephrine, but people who instead of adrenaline splash norepinephrine into the blood will rather climb into battle than run away. Testosterone gives the character of a person a temper, and the higher the level of this hormone, the more aggressive the person.

The presence and amount of certain hormones explains the behavior of a person who becomes aggressive and why everyone, in their own way, can restrain their emotions. No one has yet learned to keep this reaction under complete control.

The study of inappropriate behavior was carried out by psychologist Erich Fromm, who identified two types of aggression.

1. Benign aggression is in the service of the cause of life. A person shows this type of aggression when his interests are threatened.

2. Malignant human aggression is an acquired reaction associated with cruelty or with a pathological feeling of self-assertion through aggressiveness.

With benign aggression, you can and should fight on your own. And people with malignant aggression need the help of psychologists or psychiatrists.

How to deal with an aggressive person?

If you do not allow aggressive people to splash out emotions, then they will begin to manifest themselves against the will of a person. Help relieve stress:

Sports or physical labor;

Favorite hobby;

Hiking;

Communication with pleasant and interesting people.

Maintaining emotional balance and timely release of negative emotions in these affordable ways will help you maintain health and good mood.

» Aggressiveness theories

Why do people behave aggressively? Theories of aggression

The question of why people generally behave aggressively cannot be answered unambiguously. To explain aggressive behavior, it is very common to cite a range of causes, conditions, and motives that are connected in some way. Anger or pent-up anger, childhood neglect, violent films and computer games, and peer pressure or the desire to be seen as "cool" can all obviously explain people's aggressive behavior.

There are also a variety of scientific methods and ways to explain aggressive behavior.

Drive Theory: Aggression Is an "Internal Instinct"

The concept of "aggression" became popular thanks to psychoanalysis. Joy is the basic feeling that governs human behavior. Equally important feelings or drives are the desire for pleasure (libido) and the instinct for destruction or death (destrudo). The suppression of the death instinct, just like the suppression of the libido, can lead to serious mental disorders. If a person cannot throw out aggression, then it turns against him. From the point of view of psychoanalysis, the forms of such suppressed aggressive (auto-aggressive) actions are diverse. Some people nervously bite their nails, others lose weight right before their eyes. There are also cases of suicide. From this theory, the following conclusions can be drawn: if the instinct of destruction is inherent in man, then, of course, it should not be suppressed. On the contrary, it must be manifested in its entirety. In addition, a person must learn to control this instinct. Otherwise, it may lead to self-destruction or destruction of the environment.

Instinct theory: aggression for self-preservation

Based on the theory of instincts, which is used in ethology and sociobiology, aggressive behavior can be explained as follows: a person behaves aggressively for the purpose of self-preservation and adaptation to what is happening. One of these theories can be attributed, for example, to the “steam boiler theory”. It was first formulated by Konrad Lorenz, who studied human behavior. In his opinion, a person always has free energy, which accumulates in his body. If a certain amount of this energy has already accumulated, then it begins to be released in the form of aggression. Thus, in order for an “explosion to occur”, some special external occasion is not needed at all. To drive a person out of themselves, any trifle is enough. In order to calm down, many people play sports or chop wood. Of course, one might question whether such activities really act as a "vent valve" and prevent aggressive behavior that is harmful to society. On the contrary: there are many references to the fact that this way of self-soothing (to give vent to emotions) only stimulates aggressive behavior.

The theory of causation of aggression and frustration: aggression as a result of frustration

Other explanations for aggressive behavior are related to external factors, which are considered secondary in the "steam boiler" theory. According to the theory of causation of aggression and frustration, aggression is the result of a state of frustration. This state occurs when a person cannot achieve his goal, because he is hindered by a real or imagined hindrance. At the same time, a person feels weak, helpless and exhausted. However, aggression can occur not only as a result of frustration. Conversely, not every state of frustration entails aggression. Most likely, it occurs if the deterrence of aggression is not strong enough, and there are additional factors that cause aggression.

Learning Theory: Aggressions learn

According to new research, aggressive behavior can be explained by the fact that a person learns to be aggressive as early as childhood. Children believe that if they behave aggressively, they will be successful. They see that other children and their parents behave aggressively in some situations and achieve certain results due to this. Therefore, if children think that by doing so they will be able to achieve the desired results, they begin to copy such behavior. Based on this theory, it can be argued that the media, especially television, have a great influence on the aggressive behavior of children. However, studies show that this opinion is largely erroneous. Although children tend to imitate certain characters from films, the “real people” who surround them and from whom they actually learn something still have a decisive influence.

Social-cognitive theory: aggression is the result of information distortion

Recently, more and more researchers are working on improving the socio-cognitive model that explains the causes of aggressive human behavior. Scientists proceed from the fact that aggressive behavior is the result of a distortion in information processing, which leads to a distorted perception of the situation. In pedagogical and therapeutic practice, the socio-cognitive method of analyzing aggressive behavior is the most effective. Using this method, it is possible to purposefully diagnose distortions and influence the necessary stimuli in accordance with the stage of human development.

Aggression is not the most pleasant word in our language. Manifestations of aggression, unfortunately, are found not only in speech, but also in real life. Aggressive people can be encountered on the street, in transport, even in line. It would seem that aggression is a natural human feeling, but how unpleasant it is to feel it on yourself.

Is it possible to prevent the occurrence of aggression in oneself and protect oneself from someone else's manifestation of groundless anger?

Where does aggression come from?

The answer to this question depends on which definition of the word "aggression" we will refer to.

Etymologically, the word aggression goes back to the Proto-Indo-European word *ghredh - "to go" and is derived from the Latin ad + gradī, where ad is a prefix denoting the direction: "toward, on", and gradī - "to walk, go"; aggredi "to attack, attack".

In psychology, there are at least (!) Two practically polar views on this phenomenon.

On the one hand, aggression is a biological instinct that has developed in the course of evolution in the process of the struggle for survival. In this case, aggression is understood as any action aimed at “modifying oneself or the world around oneself”. In this sense, any initiative in any contacts with the world is aggression. For example, the process of chewing food is also an act of aggression. (Any suppression of this instinct can lead to very unpleasant consequences for a person: from psychosomatic diseases to severe personality disorders. But this, perhaps, is the topic of a separate article).

On the other hand, more often in everyday life we use the word "aggression" when we talk about the intention to cause harm (aggressive impulses) or actions that harm someone or something or demonstrate a hostile attitude. The reasons (motives) for such intentions or actions can be conscious and unconscious (intentional or instrumental aggression). From this point of view, aggressive impulses or aggressive actions can be caused by feelings of anger, disgust, fear, shame, a feeling of pain, a situation of impossibility (objective or perceived) to satisfy needs, or a situation of competition.

Depending on the degree of awareness of motives, aggression can take various forms from play: a demonstration of dexterity, strength, skills or knowledge, to malignant (compensatory): cruelty, violence, sadism, necrophilia (love for the inanimate), depression, boredom.

Is it possible to recognize the signs of incipient aggression?

As a rule, people do not become aggressive immediately. This, on the one hand, is good news (you can have time to “run back” in time), and on the other hand, you need to know the signs of growing aggression in the interlocutor in order to warn this very moment and not bring it to trouble.

Pay attention to external signs, including:

Pursed lips.

Looking away.

Deviation of the whole body away from you.

Clear unwillingness to continue the conversation.

Frightened eyes (fear can very quickly turn into its opposite - into aggression).

If you notice these signs - be attentive, and, above all, to the interlocutor: apparently, you have touched on a very important and painful topic for him. It is also possible that a person as a whole is going through a not the best period in his life now, and then he will react to many of your neutral actions as very undesirable. It's not about you, it's about how bad the person is. Treat this with understanding.

By the way, it can be useful to notice an approaching aggressive state in yourself: know that if the number of people around you suddenly increases, causing your irritation, then you are on the verge of a “breakdown”. As a rule, the point here is not in people, but in your state, which “mirror” begins to be reflected in your perception of other people. Relax, calm yourself, stop for a minute, focus on the sensations and do relaxing exercises. And for the future - take care to teach yourself to maintain peace of mind and henceforth not let “bad weather” into your soul.