The examination of Workplace Aggression as a global construct conceptualization has gained considerable attention over the past few years as organizations work to better understand and address the occurrence and consequences of this challenging construct. The purpose of this dissertation is to build on previous efforts to validate the appropriateness and usefulness of a global conceptualization of the workplace aggression construct. This dissertation has been broken up into two parts: Part 1 utilized a Confirmatory Factor Analysis approach in order to assess the existence of workplace aggression as a global construct; Part 2 utilized a series of correlational analyses to examine the relationship between a selection of commonly experienced individual strain based outcomes and the global construct conceptualization assessed in Part 1. Participants were a diverse sample of 219 working individuals from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk participant pool. Results of Part 1 did not show support for a one-factor global construct conceptualization of the workplace aggression construct. However, support was shown for a higher-order five-factor model of the construct, suggesting that it may be possible to conceptualize workplace aggression as an overarching construct that is made up of separate workplace aggression constructs. Results of Part 2 showed support for the relationships between an existing global construct workplace aggression conceptualization and a series of strain-based outcomes. Utilizing correlational analyses, additional post-hoc analyses showed that individual factors such as emotional intelligence and personality are related to the experience of workplace aggression. Further, utilizing moderated regression analysis, the results demonstrated that individuals experiencing high levels of workplace aggression reported higher job satisfaction when they felt strongly that the aggressive act was highly visible, and similarly, when they felt that there was a clear intent to cause harm. Overall, the findings of this dissertation do support the need for a simplification of its current state of measurement. Future research should continue to examine workplace aggression in an effort to shed additional light on the structure and usefulness of this complex construct.

The examination of Workplace Aggression as a global construct conceptualization has gained considerable attention over the past few years as organizations work to better understand and address the occurrence and consequences of this challenging construct. The purpose of this dissertation is to build on previous efforts to validate the appropriateness and usefulness of a global conceptualization of the workplace aggression construct. This dissertation has been broken up into two parts: Part 1 utilized a Confirmatory Factor Analysis approach in order to assess the existence of workplace aggression as a global construct; Part 2 utilized a series of correlational analyses to examine the relationship between a selection of commonly experienced individual strain based outcomes and the global construct conceptualization assessed in Part 1. Participants were a diverse sample of 219 working individuals from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk participant pool. Results of Part 1 did not show support for a one-factor global construct conceptualization of the workplace aggression construct. However, support was shown for a higher-order five-factor model of the construct, suggesting that it may be possible to conceptualize workplace aggression as an overarching construct that is made up of separate workplace aggression constructs. Results of Part 2 showed support for the relationships between an existing global construct workplace aggression conceptualization and a series of strain-based outcomes. Utilizing correlational analyses, additional post-hoc analyses showed that individual factors such as emotional intelligence and personality are related to the experience of workplace aggression. Further, utilizing moderated regression analysis, the results demonstrated that individuals experiencing high levels of workplace aggression reported higher job satisfaction when they felt strongly that the aggressive act was highly visible, and similarly, when they felt that there was a clear intent to cause harm. Overall, the findings of this dissertation do support the need for a simplification of its current state of measurement. Future research should continue to examine workplace aggression in an effort to shed additional light on the structure and usefulness of this complex construct.

Research documents considerable anxiety-related heterogeneity in youth with callous-unemotional traits (CU), a pattern of callousness and shallow emotionality (Frick & Ellis, 1999) associated with lasting impairment (Fontaine et al., 2011). This heterogeneity may relate to behavioral differences, with the presence of both CU and anxiety associated with increased questionnaire-based reports of aggression and/or historical documentations of past aggression (Kahn et al., 2013). Anxiety in CU youth is associated with greater attention to others’ distress cues (Kimonis et al., 2012) compared to CU-only counterparts, in contrast to the decreased distress-cue attentiveness thought to contribute to aggression in CU youth (Dadds et al., 2011). Through its association with improvements in CU youths’ ability to detect others’ distress, anxiety may heighten autonomic activity associated with emotional processing, in contrast to the dampened autonomic activity observed in CU youth (de Wied et al., 2012). It is possible that CU associations with distress-cue recognition and parasympathetic-based emotion-regulation vary as a function of anxiety, and in turn are associated with aggression. The present study, conducted with a sample of youth ages 7-13 (N=45), incorporated laboratory tasks and self- and caregiver-report questionnaires to assess the extent to which child anxiety, traumatic stress, CU, and their interactions, predict observed aggressive behavior toward other children and perceptions of others’ emotions while experimentally manipulating distress-cue salience. Exploratory analyses considered parasympathetic activity that may associate with observed relationships. Overall, results align with non-experimental research suggesting that CU is associated with greater aggression in the presence of anxiety (Fanti et al., 2013), and clarify that anxiety moderates the effect of CU on aggression, but only in the absence of distress cues from a potential victim. Results also hint that relationships between anxiety and parasympathetic responses to others’ distress may help explain anxiety-related heterogeneity in CU youths’ aggression. Findings suggest that children with CU and anxiety may benefit from emotional training to anticipate others’ distress and identify distress cues. In aggressive situations involving these youth, increasing others’ distress-cue salience may attenuate violence. Future research must further investigate emotional processing deficits, and their role in the development of aggression, among CU youth with anxiety.

Some behaviors in sport may be labeled: bad, unnecessary and distasteful. Sport psychologists have used concepts of aggression to understand and lessen these behaviors. To date, most research has conceptualized aggression as a product of individual cognition. Specifically, aggression is defined in the sport psychology literature as any behavior motivated by the intent to harm one's opponent (Baron, 1977; Bredemeier & Shields, 1986b; Husman & Silva, 1984; Kirker, Tenenbaum & Mattson, 2000). Consequently, sport psychology analyses of aggression tend to reproduce take-for-granted conceptions of aggression as male, physical and other-directed. To better understand sport aggression, it has been argued that symbolic interactionism has much to offer (Baird & McGannon, 2009). By utilizing symbolic interactionism we can reconceptualize aggression as a social construct given meaning in and through interaction with self and others. From this perspective, self notions and interactions with others are important "locations" of meaning making and are significant in the study of behavior. The present study used symbolic interactionism to explore female rugby players' experiences of aggression and how they interpret, define and structure experiences relative to self development. In conjunction with participant-observation, 12 semi-structured interviews with female rugby players ages 18-45 were conducted to explore: (1) how do women define themselves as ruggers/how do they (re)produce these identities in and out of rugby, (2) how do women define and experience aggression, and (3) how are these accounts used in the construction of self/identity? Data emerging from interviews and observations suggested that athletes defined and experienced behavior in ways challenging contemporary sport psychology conceptualizations of aggression. The participants often used the word aggression to describe forceful and physical play. In sport psychology literature, this is typically referred to as assertive behavior (Husman & Silva, 1984; Tenenbaum, Saks, Miller, Golden, & Doolin, 2000) and aggressive behavior is a label reserved for unacceptable behavior motivated by the intent to harm (Tenenbaum et al., 2000). According to the women in this study, unacceptable behavior was not defined by intent; rather, unacceptable behavior was a negotiated space that was constructed through notions of lack of control. That is, if a player was constructed as out of control, that player was seen as engaging in unacceptable behavior. In terms of self/identity construction, pain, contact and aggression emerged as important in the (re)production of self-related experiences within and outside of rugby. Within rugby these characteristics indicated a player's rugbyness. Outside of rugby these characteristics were often exhibited by non-rugby players as proof that rugby was a male sport. These participants both resisted and reinforced that notion. Rather than (re)define rugby by other female characteristics, these athletes used their rugby selves to say that pain, contact and aggression are not male only behaviors. The women used the bruises on their bodies to claim their rugby selves and prove, "I'm more than you think I am." This research offers a unique glimpse of female collision athletes' experiences of aggression and contributes a new conceptualization of "unacceptable" behavior to the existent sport psychology literature.

Much of the literature regarding relational aggression in romantic relationships has focused on the behaviors and outcomes of the actor and victim independently. Additionally, the relationships studied usually cover emerging adult samples, and rarely expand to long-term committed relationships, such as cohabiting or married couples. In this paper I sought to determine if relationally aggressive behaviors in long-term committed relationships over time resulted as a function of individual predictors (e.g. neuroticism), or as a process of couple interactions (e.g. couple attachment); and how these traits directly and indirectly (through relational aggression) influenced relationship quality. An Actor Partner Independence Model (APIM) was run using 1,558 individuals from the RELATE study. Anxious attachment was the strongest predictor of relational aggression. For both men and women, participating in relationally aggressive behaviors had a direct influence on their own relationship quality. Anxiously attached partners were more likely to be relationally aggressive and to have more relationally aggressive partners. Female, as well as male, relational aggression partially mediated the link between male and female anxious attachment, and female relationship quality. For men, only their own relational aggression mediated the link between male and female anxious attachment, and their own relationship quality.

No description available.

This research was supported by an award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01-HD- 059835). The NIH had no further role in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the paper for publication. The authors wish to thank the dedicated staff members of Asociacion Civil Proyectos en Salud (PROESA), Peru and Instituto Materno Perinatal, Peru for their expert technical assistance with this research. / Objective We examined associations of childhood physical and sexual abuse with risk of intimate partner violence (IPV). We also evaluated the extent to which childhood abuse was associated with self-reported general health status and symptoms of antepartum depression in a cohort of pregnant Peruvian women. Methods In-person interviews were conducted to collect information regarding history of childhood abuse and IPV from 1,521 women during early pregnancy. Antepartum depressive symptomatology was evaluated using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9. Multivariable logistic regression procedures were used to estimate adjusted odds ratios (aOR) and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI). Results Any childhood abuse was associated with 2.2-fold increased odds of lifetime IPV (95%CI: 1.72–2.83). Compared with women who reported no childhood abuse, those who reported both, childhood physical and sexual abuse had a 7.14-fold lifetime risk of physical and sexual IPV (95%CI: 4.15–12.26). The odds of experiencing physical and sexual abuse by an intimate partner in the past year was 3.33-fold higher among women with a history of childhood physical and sexual abuse as compared to women who were not abused as children (95%CI 1.60–6.89). Childhood abuse was associated with higher odds of self-reported poor health status during early pregnancy (aOR = 1.32, 95%CI: 1.04–1.68) and with symptoms of antepartum depression (aOR = 2.07, 95%CI: 1.58–2.71). Conclusion These data indicate that childhood sexual and physical abuse is associated with IPV, poor general health and depressive symptoms in early pregnancy. The high prevalence of childhood trauma and its enduring effects of on women’s health warrant concerted global health efforts in preventing violence. / : This research was supported by an award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01-HD-059835). The NIH had no further role in study design; in the collection, / Revisión por pares

The fundamental need to belong is considered one of the most basic human requirements, and universally motivates human behaviour. When this need to belong is not met, it increases the risk of mental health problems like depression, which was of interest in this dissertation. Due to the psychological consequences of not being accepted by others, humans are very attuned to perceived threats to belonging and have developed types of defense mechanisms to protect themselves against social exclusion. One such defense mechanism is rejection sensitivity, and the role of rejection sensitivity as it relates to depression was the underlying theme of this dissertation. Along with rejection sensitivity, there exist external and internal factors that serve as threats to belonging, and which are associated with depression. Two of these factors, rejection (an interpersonal factor) and perfectionism (an intrapersonal factor) were examined in relation to depression. Study 1 focused on peer rejection and the developmental pathways involved in its relation to rejection sensitivity, depression, and aggression in adolescence. Results showed that rejection and rejection sensitivity were preceded by either depression or aggression across adolescence, and although depression initiated the cascade leading to rejection sensitivity, there was a bidirectional relation across late adolescence as rejection sensitivity also predicted future depression. Study 2 focused on two types of perfectionism (i.e., self-oriented and socially prescribed), including the developmental pathways associated with their relation to rejection sensitivity and depression in adolescence. Socially prescribed perfectionism was directly related to future depression and rejection sensitivity mediated the relation between self-oriented perfectionism and depression. Depression initiated the cascade leading to rejection sensitivity and supported a bidirectional relation across late adolescence. Study 3 also focused on perfectionism, but cross-sectionally in young adults, and examined three types of perfectionism (i.e., self-oriented, socially prescribed, and other-oriented). Rejection sensitivity and socially prescribed perfectionism were positively related to depression, and other-oriented perfectionism was negatively related to depression; however, self-oriented perfectionism did not contribute significantly to depression. Contrary to what was predicted, rejection sensitivity was not a significant moderator in the relation between perfectionism and depression. Overall, rejection sensitivity, a defense mechanism against threats to the need to belong, played a significant role in the development and maintenance of depression in the absence of actual rejection, as well as in conjunction with specific types of perfectionism.

<p>Objective: Acute alcohol intoxication has been clearly identified as a risk factor for intimate partner aggression (IPA). There is a critical need for effective IPA interventions that can be applied during episodes of acute intoxication. A self-awareness intervention for general aggression that was designed to be applied during acute intoxication could fill this gap. This intervention is grounded in objective self-awareness and alcohol myopia theories, with the main premise being that intoxicated individuals who are exposed to self-awareness cues should focus on standards of correct behavior, which will serve to inhibit aggression. The purpose of the current study was to apply this intervention to alcohol-facilitated IPA and to examine potential moderators of this effect in order to determine for whom the intervention may be most effective. Method: Participants in the current study included 133 heterosexual community couples with a history of heavy drinking and IPA. Participants took part in a two-session laboratory study investigating the efficacy of this self-awareness intervention. Participants were randomly assigned to the intervention (<i>n</i> = 71) or control (<i>n</i> = 62) condition. During the study, they consumed alcohol and participated in an aggression task ostensibly against their romantic partner. Results: Findings were inconsistent with hypotheses. There was no between-group difference in laboratory aggression, and the moderators investigated in this study did not have an impact on the intervention’s efficacy. Conclusions: Present findings suggest that the self-awareness intervention may be ineffective for reducing alcohol-facilitated IPA. Potential explanations for this finding and implications for future research are discussed. </p>

Bullying is reported to be one of the most prevalent forms of violence in schools and has negative health, financial, and social outcomes. Researchers define bullying as (a) aggressive behavior that is (b) repeated over time and that involves (c) a real/ perceived imbalance of power. The literature on bullying is limited due to the absence of functional behavior assessment procedures and individualized interventions for bullying behaviors. Study 1 developed the Functional Assessment of Bullying Behaviors in Schools (FABB-S) tool. Following expert review 21 items were found to have content validity. Following revision, the items were reviewed by child work groups and were all found to have face validity. Study 2 evaluated the effectiveness of the FABB-S to lead to reductions in aggression toward peers. Direct observation and staff daily rating data indicated that one participant’s problem behavior showed initial signs of decrease following intervention, a second participant’s problem behavior showed increased stability throughout intervention, and a third participant’s problem behavior showed signs of decrease at the beginning and ending of the intervention phase. Social validity data indicated that student and staff participants found the FABB-S and selected interventions to be effective and acceptable. Discussion includes limitations and area for future research.