Revista de Estudios Sociales (Jun 2003)
Agresión reactiva, agresión instrumental y el ciclo de la violencia.
Abstract
In this article the author analyzes the mechanisms by which violence in the context where children grow (either political or common violence) can promote the learning of different kinds of aggressive behaviors. These aggressive behaviors can contribute, at their turn, to the reproduction of violence in that context, thus creating a cycle of violence. The article analyzes in particular two trajectories of this cycle, one related to reactive aggression and the other with instrumental aggression. It is shown that reactive aggression - produced as a defensive response to a perceived or real aggression - has social, cognitive and emotional dynamics different than those of instrumental aggression - used as a mean to reach a goal without a previous provocation. Reactive and instrumental aggressions have also different origins and predict different future violent behaviors. Distinguishing between these two kinds of trajectories allows proposing different kinds of interventions to break the cycle of violence. In this way, it is possible to reduce the reproduction of violence in children even if political and common violence remain present in our context.
