Negative Feelings Exacerbate Hostile Attributions of Intent in Highly Aggressive Boys

Abstract

Tested the hypothesis that aggressive boys' tendency to attribute hostile intentions to peers is exacerbated in a negative emotional state. Twenty-nine highly aggressive boys in special education, 12 moderately aggressive boys in regular education, and 16 nonaggressive boys in regular education inferred peers' intentions in 8 vignettes concerning ambiguous provocation by peers. Mild negative emotions were induced by unjust loss of a manipulated computer game. Half the vignettes were completed in this negative emotional state. After completion of all vignettes, the game was played again and won to reinduce positive feelings. Self-ratings of feelings obtained throughout the study showed the manipulations consecutively induced negative and positive feelings. Negative feelings increased hostile attribution of intent in the highly aggressive group. Highly and moderately aggressive boys responded more aggressively than nonaggressive boys.

The Effect of Induced Mood on Children’s Social Information Processing: Goal Clarification and Response Decision

“…In addition, these results converge with those of Lemerise et al (2006) who showed that rejected-aggressive children's goals and social problem-solving responses (see also Lemerise et al 2005) were more hostile when provocateurs displayed anger. Finally our findings are consistent with work from several researchers suggesting that rejected-aggressive children and adolescents have difficulty managing their anger in challenging social situations (DiLiberto et al 2002;Graham et al 1992;Hubbard et al 2002;Orobio de Castro et al 2005) and that negative arousal has a more disruptive effect on the SIP of aggressive than nonaggressive children (Dodge and Somberg 1987;Orobio de Castro et al 2003;Vitaro et al 1989). Although previous studies extended our understanding of how negative arousal affects SIP, the current study extended past research by finding effects of discrete emotions on children's goal selection.…”

“…However, when a "threat" was staged via an "overheard" conversation, rejected-aggressive boys made more SIP errors of presumed hostility and hostile attributions than did adjusted-nonaggressive boys (Dodge and Somberg 1987). Similar results were reported when a situational manipulation which involved unjustly losing a computer game was used (Orobio de Castro et al 2003). Finally, there is evidence that when the staged provocation was more intense (involving a "live" confederate whose behavior was quite provoking), the SIP (attributions and social problem solving) of both adjusted and rejected-aggressive first and second graders was disrupted, particularly when assessed immediately after the provocation (Vitaro et al 1989).…”

“…Although there has been a great deal of research on the response decision step and some research on goal clarification, all of this work has been done under test conditions that are relatively "relaxed" in that participants did not experience a manipulation designed to increase their arousal. In contrast to work on early stage SIP (e.g., Dodge and Somberg 1987;Orobio de Castro et al 2003;Vitaro et al 1989), no SIP research has examined goal clarification or response decision under conditions designed to increase participants' arousal. Given that mood induction effects are relatively brief (10-15 min), and the fact that these two SIP steps have only been studied under relaxed conditions, the present study focuses on goal clarification and response evaluation.…”

Real‐time hostile attribution measurement and aggression in children

“…Among aggressive children, more hostile attributions tend to be made when a negative emotional state was induced, as opposed to a positive emotional state (Dodge & Somberg, 1987;Orobio de Castro, Slot, Bosch, Koops, & Veerman, 2003). Emotion was measured in terms of arousal reactivity by Williams, Lochman, Phillips, and Barry (2003) who found that moderately aggressive boys exhibited increased heart rate and increased hostile attributions when a threat was introduced.…”

Internalizing Symptoms and Affective Reactivity in Relation to the Severity of Aggression in Clinically Referred, Behavior-Disordered Children

“…Laboratory studies likewise show that aggression, in particular, is associated with negative emotionality (e.g., anger) and limited emotional competence (e.g. low ability to identify the causes of aggression; Bohnert, Crnic, & Lim, 2003;Cole, Zahn-Waxler, Fox, Usher, & Welsh, 1996;de Castro, Slot, Bosch, Koops, & Veerman, 2003). Because difficulties in modulating emotional expressions may relate to the presence of externalizing and internalizing disorders (Keenan, 2000), the role of negative emotionality and its regulation in patient populations deserve further empirical evaluation (see Eisenberg et al, 2001).…”