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Effects of Victim's Pain Cues, Victim's Race, and Level of Prior Instigation upon Physical Aggression 1
Author(s) -
Baron Robert A.
Publication year - 1979
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-1816.1979.tb00797.x
Subject(s) - aggression , psychology , white (mutation) , race (biology) , social psychology , developmental psychology , biochemistry , chemistry , botany , biology , gene
Sixty‐four white undergraduate males participated in an experiment designed to examine the effects of victin's pain cues, victim's racial identity, and level of prior instigation upon physical aggression. On the basis of previous research, it was tentatively predicted that pain cues from a different‐race victim would exert less influence upon subjects' later behavior than similar feedback from a same‐race victim. Results offered support for this prediction. Specifically, pain cues from a black victim were less effective in inhibiting subsequent aggression by nonangry white subjects, and less effective in facilitating subsequent aggression by angry white subjects, than identical feedback from a white victim. An interpretation of these findings in terms of aggressors' emotional reactions to pain cues from their victim was suggested.