Gender differences in aggressive behavior at admission to a psychiatric hospital

As aggressive behavior has a negative impact in general psychiatry, its influence specifically from a gender-related point of view in an in-patient population of a psychiatric clinic was assessed at the time of admission. A group of 521 successively admitted psychiatric in-patients was investigated at admission with the help of the "Social Dysfunction and Aggression Scale". A slightly higher frequency and intensity of "verbal aggressive behavior" was observed in males. Within the other categories of aggressive behavior ("tension", "physical violence to things", and "assaults"), however, the percentages and intensities of gender-related aggressive behavior did not differ significantly. Furthermore, under the covarying impact of various psychiatric diagnoses, the gender-related differences concerning the intensity of "verbal aggressive behavior" disappeared. When comparing male and female subgroups, it was notable that male schizophrenic patients were younger than female patients when displaying comparable risks of showing at least one kind of aggressive behavior. In addition, in the female subgroup, "self-injurious behavior" was more strongly correlated to the category "tension" than in the male subgroup. Although there are some methodological shortcomings, the present results show that there are small qualitative differences in gender-related aggressive behavior in addition to minimal quantitative differences in the frequency and intensity of "verbal aggressive behavior" at admission.     

Gender differences in the recognition of laterally presented affective nouns

Evidence suggests that the cerebral hemispheres are differentially specialised for the processing of positively and negatively valenced affective material. The present study examined the consequences of this for the availability in each hemisphere of lexical entries related to positive, neutral, and negative affect. A threshold recognition task was used to assess the identification of positive, neutral, and negative emotionally toned nouns projected to the right or left visual field. A strong lateral asymmetry in favour of right visual field recognition of nouns was observed. Whereas women showed no evidence of changes in lateral asymmetry as a function of affect, lateral asymmetry in men was significantly greater for positive nouns. This finding points to a difference in the representation of affective material in the left and right lexicons of the male brain, and provides support for the notion that gender may be one of the keys to reconciling some of the contradictory findings that characterise this area of research.     

Gender differences in the correlates of preschoolers' behavior

This study is concerned with the nature of gender differences in 4-year-olds. In each of three replications, 18–21 girls and 20–22 boys (all white) were observed at home and school. Temperamental characteristics were assessed and (in one replication) a self-concept instrument was used. Gender differences in the frequencies of particular types of interaction were few and inconsistent across replications. There were, however, consistent gender differences in the correlations between characteristics and aspects of behavior. For instance, boys tended to be less consistent across situations in showing hostility, and to mix positive and negative interactions more, than girls. Mothers' use of Strong Control had different correlates in boys and girls. It is suggested that such differences in relations between measures may provide the raw material from which later gender differences develop.     

On the relationship between negative affective priming and prefrontal cognitive control mechanisms

Although several studies have examined inhibition of affective stimuli, valence-dependent cognitive control effects remain poorly understood. Behavioural and functional imaging (functional magnetic resonance imaging) data were collected from 17 healthy participants to examine neural correlates of the Negative Affective Priming (NAP) task. We created relative ratio scores considering the reaction times of prime trials in order to assess the amount of interference after the presentation of negative and positive distracter words. Behavioural results showed an attenuated NAP effect for negative distracters compared to neutral stimuli. Furthermore, priming negative distracters generated more interference by reacting to the probe target than positive distracters. Neuroimaging data revealed a stronger prefrontal activation during negative NAP trials compared to positive NAP and neutral control trials, which was reflected in a heightened activation of superior and middle frontal gyrus as well as parietal cortex. The findings show the impact of negative distracters on prefrontal response, contributing to the understanding of NAP effects in healthy subjects.     

Gender differences in implicit and explicit memory for affective passages

Thirty-two participants were administered 4 verbal tasks, an Implicit Affective Task, an Implicit Neutral Task, an Explicit Affective Task, and an Explicit Neutral Task. For the Implicit Tasks, participants were timed while reading passages aloud as quickly as possible, but not so quickly that they did not understand. A target verbal passage was repeated three times, and alternated with other previously unread passages. The Implicit Affective and Neutral passages had strong affective or neutral content, respectively. The Explicit Tasks were administered at the end of testing, and consisted of multiple choice questions regarding the passages. Priming effects in terms of more rapid reading speed for the target compared to non-target passages were seen for both the Implicit Affective Task and the Implicit Neutral Task. Overall reading speed was faster for the passages with neutral compared to affective content, consistent with studies of the emotional Stroop effect. For the Explicit memory tasks, overall performance was better on the items from the repeated passage, and on the Affective compared to Neutral Task. The male subjects showed greater priming for affective material than female subjects, and a greater gain than female subjects in explicit memory for affective compared to neutral material.     

Gender and culture differences in touching behavior

The authors used gender and culture to examine the theory that touching behavior is an expression of dominance. Participants were 120 men and women from Italy, the Czech Republic, and the United States. The authors examined both hand touches and nonhand touches. For hand touches, there was a significant gender-by-culture interaction in that Czech men as a group touched more than any of the other groups. For nonhand touches, Czech and Italian women and Italian men as groups touched significantly more than any of the other groups. Taken in cultural context, these results seem to support the dominance theory for touches with the hand but not for nonhand touches. The authors discussed implications and future directions.     

Stress exposure and affective modulation of aggressive behavior in men and women

To study differences in the effects of stress exposure and affective responding on aggression in men and women, the authors examined the effects of an acute stressor (air blast) on subsequent aggressive behavior, measured as the intensity of shocks men and women delivered to a putative employee. The authors measured participants' affective responding using the startle reflex. Results showed that although men and women did not differ in their startle responses to the actual stressor, high stress led to contrasting patterns of subsequent aggressive behavior. Women under high stress responded with less aggression than women under low stress, whereas men exposed to high stress exhibited increases in aggression relative to those under low stress. Affective responding during the stressor differentially modulated aggression in men and women: Startle responses predicted increasing levels of aggression in men and less aggression in women. These findings suggest that although men and women show similar basic affective processing in response to stressors, the behavioral profiles associated with stress differ in men and women. These findings have implications for understanding gender differences in the prevalence of internalizing and externalizing psychopathology.     

Dynamic variations in affective priming

The present study investigates the dynamics of emotional processing and awareness using an affective facial priming paradigm in conjunction with a multimodal assessment of awareness. Key facial primes are visually masked, and are presented for brief (unconscious) and extended (conscious) durations. Using a preference measure, we examine whether the effects of the primes differ qualitatively (Murphy & Zajonc, 1993). We show that: (a) unconscious affective priming with faces emerges strongly in initial presentations and diminishes rapidly with repetition; (b) conscious affective priming also emerges strongly in initial presentations, however it persists in strength with repetition; and (c) in contrast to other reports on the salience of negative stimuli, happy faces appear more salient than sad faces when presented outside awareness. We discuss the limits and extensions of unconscious affective priming with faces, and consider several methodological and conceptual questions concerning emotional processing out of awareness.     

Trial-by-trial effects in the affective priming paradigm

In this paper, we yield evidence for the dependence of affective priming on the congruency of the previous trial. Affective priming refers to the finding that valence categorizations of targets are facilitated when the preceding prime is of the same valence. In two experiments, affective priming was diminished after incongruent trials (i.e., prime and target were of different valence), whereas, significant affective priming was observed after congruent trials (i.e., prime and target were of same valence). We compare this pattern to the known sequential dependencies in Stroop- and Eriksen-type tasks. Furthermore, our results can help to improve the statistical power of studies in which the affective priming task is used as a measure for automatic evaluations of attitude-objects.     

Age differences and the identity negative priming effect: an updated meta-analysis

A recent meta-analysis (P. Verhaeghen & L. De Meersman, 1998a) revealed that older adults show a reliable but significantly reduced negative priming effect compared with young adults. The present study provides an updated quantitative review on the effect of aging on the magnitude of the negative priming effect in identity tasks. This analysis demonstrated that the negative priming effect was not significantly different between young and old adults. This result differs from P. Verhaeghen and L. De Meersman's study. The implications of this finding for inhibitory-based theories of cognitive aging are discussed.     

Gender differences in emotional and overt/covert aggressive responses to stress

We examined the role of stress exposure on gender differences in hostile (emotional and behavioral) reactions within the context of a laboratory paradigm. Aggressive behavior was indexed via the intensity (overt) and the duration (covert) of putative shocks delivered to a confederate. Half of the participants were exposed to a chronic stressor (high stress) and half were not (low stress). Participants' emotional responses were measured via self-report mood ratings before and after the experiment. Men displayed higher aggression in both stress conditions, which corresponded to their ratings of state hostility. On the other hand, women in high stress delivered lower intensity shocks, and this decreased overt aggression was positively correlated with sadness ratings. However, women did not decrease their levels of shock duration (covert aggression) under high stress and showed equivalent shock duration compared with men in high stress. These findings are discussed in terms of differential overt manifestations of distress between men and women.     

Predicting aggressive driving behavior from anger and negative cognitions

The purpose of the current study was to evaluate the anger experience and expression, as well as cognitive distortions, of individuals who self-report higher and lower levels of driver aggression. Fifty-seven higher driver aggression participants and 73 lower driver aggression participants completed measures of trait anger, driving anger, anger expression, angry thoughts while driving, hostile thoughts, and dysfunctional attitudes. The present study results suggest that higher aggression drivers demonstrate a different pattern of affective experience, problematic cognitive tendencies, and subsequent negative outcomes in comparison to those reporting lower levels of aggression. Future research should continue to investigate patterns of negative cognitions for aggressive drivers, in order to inform treatment and prevention strategies for this societal concern.     

Gender priming in Italian

The goals of the present study were (1) to determine whether grammatical gender on a noun modifier can prime recognition of the following noun, (2) to determine whether the priming effect involves facilitation, inhibition, or both, and (3) to compare performance across three different tasks that vary in the degree to which explicit attention to gender is required, including word repetition, gender monitoring, and grammaticality judgment. Results showed a clear effect of gender priming, involving both facilitation and inhibition. Priming was observed whether or not the subjects’ attention was directed to gender per se. Results suggest that gender priming involves a combination of controlled postlexical processing and automatic prelexical processing. Implications for different models of lexical access are discussed, with special reference to modular versus interactive-activation theories.     

Gender differences in smoking behavior in a university workplace

Behavioral approaches to smoking intervention benefit from an understanding of smoking behavior. We investigated gender differences in smoking behavior by observing 292 men and 648 women smoking in a university workplace. Although men smoked more cigarettes in longer break times than women, there were no gender differences in the time individual cigarettes were lit or time in the mouth. However, men inhaled significnatly more than women. The social environment differed with male smokers talking to equal numbers of men and women, while female subjects talked to more females than males while smoking. In smoking lounges, more women than men held the cigarettes near their face (38 vs. 28%). With increasing age, male smokers took longer breaks, had cigarettes lit for less time, and talked to more men, whereas with increasing age female smokers took fewer puffs and talked to fewer men. Thus men take longer breaks, smoke more cigarettes, and inhale more often than women in a university workplace setting.     

Gender and priming differences in speed of processing of information relating to social structure

Previous research has shown that women and men’s different interactional contexts result in selective differences in retention of information (e.g., Gabriel & Gardner, 1999). This study tested the hypothesis that there should be broad gender-related differences in latencies of retrieval of information focused on groups or dyads, with women processing the latter more rapidly, and men processing the former more rapidly. Participants were given a diary reading task with explicit recall instructions. Results showed that although no difference was found in overall retention of items, women responded more rapidly to items referring to dyads, while men responded more rapidly to items referring to groups. In addition, a strong effect of the gender of the protagonist of the diary was found. Participants of both gender responded more rapidly to dyadic items when the protagonist was female but responded more rapidly to group items when the protagonist was male. These results indicate that gender differences in social structure result in differences in encoding and retrieval of broad classes of information that are not accountable for by selective retention.     

Gender differences in eating behavior and body weight regulation

Gender differences in food intake and selection first appear in adolescence. Men consume more calories than women, and the sexes have different eating styles, which indicate that women have been socialized to eat in a more feminine manner. Women experience more food-related conflict than men do, in that they like fattening foods but perceive that they should not eat them. Pressures to be thin are present in early adolescence, as noted by dieting behavior starting in very young girls. Women experience more dissatisfaction with their body weight and shape than men do. Sociocultural and psychological factors may be important in the etiology of eating disorders, which are much more prevalent in females than in males. Thus, further studies of gender differences in eating behavior will be important for understanding the etiology of eating and body-weight disorders and for designing gender-appropriate treatments.     

Gender differences in the intention to react to aggressive action at home and in the workplace

This study explored gender differences in escalatory tendencies, defined as individuals' intentions to react when faced with the prospect of potential aggression from others. The escalatory tendencies are based on an interaction unit of analysis, which is a proxy representation of behavioral intention from planned behavior theory. This study consists of a convenience sample of 264 male and female participants who were asked to report their escalatory tendencies following verbal and physical forms of aggression committed by various hypothetical offenders, including their intimate partner at home, as well as the men and women at work who are in higher, lower, or equal positions. The main findings support the assumptions that escalatory tendencies toward verbal aggression are higher than those toward physical aggression; that escalatory tendencies at work are higher toward lower status workers than toward those of higher status; that escalatory tendencies within the same gender are higher than between genders; and that women tend to escalate more against their spouses than do men. The findings emphasize the importance of studying aggression and escalatory tendencies in context. Aggr. Behav. 32:1–9, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Gender differences in negative affect and well-being: the case for emotional intensity

Affect intensity (AI) may reconcile 2 seemingly paradoxical findings: Women report more negative affect than men but equal happiness as men. AI describes people's varying response intensity to identical emotional stimuli. A college sample of 66 women and 34 men was assessed on both positive and negative affect using 4 measurement methods: self-report, peer report, daily report, and memory performance. A principal-components analysis revealed an affect balance component and an AI component. Multimeasure affect balance and AI scores were created, and t tests were computed that showed women to be as happy as and more intense than men. Gender accounted for less than 1% of the variance in happiness but over 13% in AI. Thus, depression findings of more negative affect in women do not conflict with well-being findings of equal happiness across gender. Generally, women's more intense positive emotions balance their higher negative affect.     

The affective regulation of cognitive priming

Semantic and affective priming are classic effects observed in cognitive and social psychology, respectively. The authors discovered that affect regulates such priming effects. In Experiment 1, positive and negative moods were induced before one of three priming tasks; evaluation, categorization, or lexical decision. As predicted, positive affect led to both affective priming (evaluation task) and semantic priming (category and lexical decision tasks). However, negative affect inhibited such effects. In Experiment 2, participants in their natural affective state completed the same priming tasks as in Experiment 1. As expected, affective priming (evaluation task) and category priming (categorization and lexical decision tasks) were observed in such resting affective states. Hence, the authors conclude that negative affect inhibits semantic and affective priming. These results support recent theoretical models, which suggest that positive affect promotes associations among strong and weak concepts, and that negative affect impairs such associations (Clore & Storbeck, 2006; Kuhl, 2000).