בערקאָוויץ ל ביאָלאָגי און אַגרעסיוו

​​​​​​​Chapter 12 touches briefly on two topics not previously discussed that may be of particular interest to the reader.

First, I will consider the influence of biological factors on aggression. Although the focus of this book is on the psychological processes and factors in immediate present and/or past situations, we still need to agree that aggression in humans and other animals is also due to physiological processes in the body and brain.

Numerous studies have already been carried out on the role played by biological determinants. However, the next chapter will be very selective and will touch on only a small part of our knowledge about the influence of physiology on aggression. Having briefly considered the idea of ​​aggressive instincts, I examine the influence of heredity on people’s propensities for violence, and then I examine the possible influence of sex hormones on various manifestations of aggressiveness.

The chapter ends with a brief overview of how alcohol can influence the commission of violence. This chapter deals primarily with questions of methodology. Many of the ideas and assumptions presented here are based on laboratory experiments conducted with children and adults.

Further reasoning is devoted to the logic used by researchers conducting experiments on human behavior.

Thirst for hatred and destruction?

In 1932, the League of Nations invited Albert Einstein to choose an outstanding person and exchange views with him on the most pressing problems of our time. The League of Nations wanted to publish the discussion in order to facilitate this communication among the intellectual leaders of today. Einstein agreed and offered to discuss the causes of international conflicts. The memory of the monstrous massacre of the First World War was still vividly preserved in the memory of the scientist, and he believed that there was no question more important than «the search for some way to save humanity from the threat of war.» The great physicist certainly did not expect a simple solution to this problem. Suspecting that militancy and cruelty lurked in human psychology, he turned to the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, for confirmation of his hypothesis. See →

Are people possessed by the instinct of violence? What is instinct?

In order to appreciate the concept of an instinctive desire for aggression, we must first clarify the meaning of the term «instinct». The word is used in quite different ways, and it is not always possible to say with certainty what exactly is meant when one speaks of instinctive behavior. We sometimes hear that a person, under the influence of a sudden situation, «acted instinctively.» Does this mean that he reacted in a genetically programmed way, or that he or she reacted to an unexpected situation without thinking? See →

Criticism of the traditional concept of instinct

The main problem with the traditional concept of instinct is the lack of a sufficient empirical basis. Animal behaviorists have seriously questioned a number of Lorenz’s strong claims about animal aggressiveness. Take, in particular, his remarks on the automatic inhibition of aggression in various animal species. Lorenz stated that most animals that can easily kill other members of their species have instinctive mechanisms that quickly stop their attacks. Humans lack such a mechanism, and we are the only species to exterminate itself. See →

Influence of heredity on aggressiveness

In July 1966, a mentally deranged young man named Richard Speck murdered eight nurses in Chicago. The terrible crime attracted the attention of the whole country, the press described this incident in detail. It became known to the general public that Speck wore a «born to awaken hell» tattoo on his arm.

We don’t know if Richard Speck was actually born with criminal tendencies that led him inexorably to commit this crime, or if the «violent genes» that somehow motivated him to kill came from his parents, but I want to ask more general question: is there any hereditary predisposition to violence? See →

Sex differences in the manifestation of aggression

Differences in the manifestation of aggression in representatives of both sexes have become the subject of discussions in recent years. Many readers will perhaps be surprised to learn that there is controversy on this topic. At first glance, it seems obvious that men are more prone to violent attacks than women. Despite this, many psychologists believe that the difference is not so obvious, and sometimes not at all noticeable (see, for example: Frodi, Macalay & Thome, 1977). Let us consider studies of these differences and try to determine the role of sex hormones in stimulating aggression. See →

ווירקונג פון כאָרמאָונז

Sex hormones can influence the aggressiveness of the animal. One has only to look at what happens when an animal is castrated. A wild stallion turns into an obedient horse, a wild bull becomes a slow ox, a playful dog becomes a sedate pet. There may also be an opposite effect. When a castrated male animal is injected with testosterone, its aggressiveness increases again (a classic study on this subject was made by Elizabeth Beeman, Beeman, 1947).

Maybe human aggression, like animal aggression, depends on male sex hormones? See →

Alcohol and aggression

The final topic of my brief review of the influence of biological factors on aggression is the effect of alcohol. It has long been known that people’s actions can change dramatically after drinking alcohol, that alcohol can, in the words of Shakespeare, «steal their minds» and, perhaps, even «turn them into animals.»

Crime statistics reveal a clear relationship between alcohol and violence. For example, in studies of the relationship between intoxication and murders of people, alcohol played a role in half or two-thirds of all murders recorded by US police in recent years. Alcoholic beverages also influence various kinds of antisocial behavior, including domestic violence. See →

קיצער

In this chapter, I have considered several ways in which biological processes influence aggressive behavior. I started with an analysis of the traditional concept of aggressive instinct, in particular the use of this concept in the psychoanalytic theory of Sigmund Freud and in somewhat similar formulations put forward by Konrad Lorenz. Despite the fact that the term «instinct» is extremely vague and has a number of different meanings, both Freud and Lorentz considered the «aggressive instinct» to be an innate and spontaneously generated impulse to destroy a person. See →

טשאַפּטער קסנומקס

Standard experimental procedure. Some arguments in support of laboratory experiments. See →