The studies presented in this paper examined empathy, especially perspective taking, as a potential inhibitor of interpersonal aggression. The theoretical rationale for these investigations derived from Zillmann's [(1988): Aggressive Behavior 14: 51–64] cognitive excitation model. Study 1 revealed that dispositional empathy correlates negatively with self‐reported aggression and with conflict responses that reflect little concern for the needs of the other party. Empathy also was positively related to constructive responses to interpersonal conflict (i. e., those that do involve concern for the needs of the other party). In Study 2, perspective taking was manipulated with instructions to subjects prior to participation in a reaction‐time task designed to measure aggression. When threat was relatively low, subjects who were instructed to take the perspective of the target responded less aggressively than did those who had been instructed to focus on the task. Study 3 examined the effect of dispositional perspective taking on verbal aggression. Threat was manipulated in terms of the combination of provocation and gender of the interactants. As predicted, perspective taking related to aggression inhibition under conditions of moderate threat–for males under low provocation and females under high provocation. These effects were predicted and explained in the context of the cognitive‐excitation model. © 1994 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.

The present study attempted to determine the effects of deception and harm on research participants' perceptions of their experiences in psychology experiments. In addition, the role of debriefing in reducing any negative effects was examined. Four hundred and sixty-four students who had participated in psychology experiments during the academic quarter completed questionnaires that included items dealing with their perceptions of harm and benefit, adequacy of debriefing, and experimenters' behavior. Results indicated that those participants who had been deceived evaluated their experience more positively than those who had not participated in deception experiments. Also, effective debriefing seemed to eliminate negative effects perceived by participants who felt they had been harmed.Ethical aspects of psychological research have received considerable attention during the last two decades, emerging in the 1960s as an important methodological issue with the controversy surrounding Milgram's (1963) study of obedience (cf. Baumrind, 1964;Milgram, 1964). Initially, concern with the "ethics" involved in psychological research using human participants centered around possible traumatic psychological consequences to the research participant but soon expanded to cover other issues such as the use of deception (Kelman, 1967), invasion of privacy (Panel on Privacy and Behavioral Research, 1967), and, later, informed consent (Berscheid, Baron, Dermer, &Libman, 1973). As a result of studies such as these and the massive undertaking by the American Psychological Association (APA) Ad Hoc Committee on Ethical Standards in Psychological

OBJECTIVES:This study examined employment patterns of African-American and White workers and rates of unintentional fatal injuries, METHODS: Medical examiner and census data were used to compare occupational fatality rates for African Americans and Whites in North Carolina and to adjust for racial differences in employment patterns. RESULTS: African Americans' occupational fatality rate was higher by a factor of 1.3 to 1.5. Differences in employment structure appear to explain much of this disparity. However, the fatality rate for African-American men would have been elevated even if they had had the same employment patterns as White men. CONCLUSIONS: inequalities in access to the labor market, unequal distribution of risk within jobs, and explicit discrimination are all potential explanations for racial disparities in occupational injury mortality. These conditions can be addressed through a combination of social and workplace interventions, including efforts to improve conditions for the most disadvantaged workers.

Intoxication of the assailant and/or victim is often mentioned in relation to acquaintance rape. The present study tests how independent observers use this information in their perceptions of acquaintance and stranger rape. One hundred and forty-nine females and 104 males read scenarios depicting a sexual assault and made attributions of responsibility for the rape and evaluated the actors. Victims’ intoxication consistently influenced perceptions of victim culpability as well as respondent evaluation of her. The impact of closeness of relationship was much more complex and less consistent than the effects of victim intoxication.

Perspective-taking functions as an inhibitor of interpersonal aggression and as a facilitator of prosocial behavior. The present study examined the extent to which perspective-taking enhances nonaggressive responses in a situation in which people typically make aggressive responses. It also examined the relationship between perspective-taking and response to interpersonal context. Subjects participated in a reaction-time task in which they could respond either aggressively or nonaggressively in two different interpersonal contexts (i.e., the target either increased or decreased provocation during the interaction). As predicted, perspective-taking was related to the inhibition of aggressive responding and the facilitation of nonaggressive responding. In general, perspective-taking was associated with less aggression, including relatively more positive and fewer negative responses. This was especially the case in the interpersonal context in which the target had increased provocation across the trials of the task.

The present study examined two explanations for gender differences in expression of direct and indirect aggression. The social sanction model suggests that aggressor and target gender effects may be accounted for in terms of social sanctions against behaving aggressively; indirect aggression is the likely outcome of inhibitions against expression of direct aggression. The threat argument suggests that high levels of direct aggression in male-male dyads as well as apparent inhibitions against harming females might be accounted for by the fact that males are more threatening targets than are females. Research participants completed a questionnaire measure of direct and indirect aggression twice, once with reference to their behavior toward a same-gender target and once with reference to their behavior toward an other-gender target. Although most direct aggression was reported by male aggressors toward male targets, gender of target did not relate to indirect aggression. Males reported approximately equal levels of indirect and direct aggression. Although females reported using more indirect than direct aggression, they did not differ from males in their reports of the frequency of use of indirect aggression. These results provided some support for both models of gender effects on human aggression and suggest the appropriateness of a relatively complex model of gender effects on aggression. Aggr. Behav. 25:425-434, 1999.

Two studies were conducted to design and validate a measure of perceptions of risk in intimacy. A 10-item scale with high internal consistency was developed and related to romantic involvement, self-esteem, assertiveness, interpersonal trust, sensation seeking, extraversion and attitudes toward love. Individuals who scored high on this `Risk in Intimacy Inventory' (i.e. who perceived high levels of risk in intimate relationships) reported fewer close relationships, less assertiveness, diminished trust in others, more introverted tendencies, and more hesitant approaches toward love than did individuals who scored lower on the scale. High scoring respondents also reported relatively high levels of thrill and adventure seeking and boredom susceptibility on the Sensation Seeking Scale. Potential applications of the scale are discussed.

A multiple factor approach was used to test additive and multiplicative models as well as to isolate a best predictive model of physical aggression. The variables of aggressive learning history, provocation, sex of target, sex of subject, sex‐role orientation, and aggressive tendencies were selected. Eighty‐three males and 117 females participated in the experimental session. Multiple regression analyses indicated that multiple predictor models were able to account for significantly more variance than were single predictor models; however, multiplicative models were unable to increase predictive efficacy. A model composed of sex of target, masculinity, and aggressive tendencies was established as the best predictive model for unprovoked aggression; provocation, masculinity, and aggressive tendencies made up the best predictive model of provoked aggression. © 1992 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.