Effects of Situational Aggression Cues: A Quantitative … · Effects of Situational Aggression...

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology1990, Vol. 58, No. 4,622-633

Copyright 1990 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.0022-3514/90/J00.75

Effects of Situational Aggression Cues: A Quantitative Review

Michael Carlson, Amy Marcus-Newhall, and Norman MillerUniversity of Southern California

Meta-analytic procedures were used to assess the degree to which aggression-related cues present inthe environment facilitate aggressive responding among negatively aroused subjects. The first study,which examined the so-called weapons effect, the effect of name-mediated cues, and other cue effects,showed clear evidence that aggression cues augment aggressive responses in negatively aroused sub-jects. This was true for the overall analysis and for name-mediated cues, but confirmation of theweapons effect was restricted to cases wherein subject sophistication and evaluation apprehensionwere low. A second study used partial correlation analysis to assess independently the effects of sevenpotential mediators of aggression cue effects. Of these, target-based facilitation and harm capacityof the aggressive response were found to mediate the magnitude of cue-facilitated aggression. A thirdstudy showed that these mediators augmented cue effects among neutral as well as negatively arousedsubjects. These outcomes are interpreted as emphasizing the role of cognitive factors in the expres-sion of both impulsive and nonimpulsive aggression.

A reliable and commonsense finding is that people who areangry behave more aggressively (e.g., Baron, 1971). Further-more, a body of research suggests that when individuals are an-gered, the resulting increase in their aggression will be greaterif situational cues associated with either violence (e.g., Berko-witz & LePage, 1967) or unpleasantness (e.g., Berkowitz &Frodi, 1979) are present.

According to Berkowitz (1982, 1983), the aggression dis-played by angry individuals has a strong impulsive componentand is most likely to occur when cognitively based inhibitoryrestraints are minimal. An environmental cue, such as the inci-dental presence of a revolver, may act in an automatic mannerto stimulate aggressive thoughts and actions and thereby en-hance the level of impulsively expressed aggression. AlthoughBerkowitz (1965) originally proposed that environmental cueswere a necessary component of impulsive aggression, he morerecently maintained that cues merely facilitate the expressionof such aggressiveness (e.g., Berkowitz, 1978).

To account for the effects of aggression cues, Berkowitz(1974, 1982, 1983) has proposed at least three explanations.First, such cues may function as conditioned stimuli that, hav-ing been previously associated with aggression, are capable ofevoking a conditioned aggressive response. A second explana-tion was drawn from Leventhal's (1980) theory of emotion. Ac-cording to Leventhal, negative emotions such as anger includea schematic component that in part defines the emotion andguides behavior. Situational cues that stimulate images of un-pleasantness or violence may prime or further strengthen theeffects of such schemata and thereby facilitate the experience ofnegative emotion and the subsequent expression of aggression.

The preparation of this article was facilitated by National ScienceFoundation Grant BSN 8719439 to Norman Miller and a Haynes Foun-dation Fellowship to Michael Carlson.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Nor-man Miller, Department of Psychology, Seeley G. Mudd Building, Uni-versity of Southern California, University Park, Los Angeles, California90089.

As a third possibility, Berkowitz (1974) suggested that cues mayfunction as discriminative stimuli. As such, they may signal toan individual that acting aggressively will provide reinforce-ment.

A controversial research issue concerned with the effects ofsituational cues on aggression centers on the validity of the so-called "weapons effect." In a classic experiment (Berkowitz &LePage, 1967), angered subjects administered a greater numberof retaliatory shocks against their previous provocateur when ashotgun and a revolver (as opposed to badminton racquets orno object at all) were lying on the table in front of them. Ber-kowitz and LePage concluded that the situational presence ofweapons serves as a cue that, in a rather automatic fashion,stimulates aggressiveness. A series of attempts to replicate theeffect failed, however (Buss, Booker, & Buss, 1972; Ellis, Weiner,& Miller, 1971; Page & Scheldt, 1971), and the claim was ad-vanced that the original finding was due to experimental de-mand. Although subsequent research has suggested that,counter to the demand explanation, the weapons effect wasmost likely to occur among the least apprehensive, least hypoth-esis-aware subjects (Simons & Turner, 1976; Turner & Simons,1974; Turner, Simons, Berkowitz, & Frodi, 1977), a good dealof skepticism nonetheless remains (e.g., Zillman, 1979).

Apart from weapons, such cues as name-mediated associa-tions with violence (Berkowitz & Geen, 1966, 1967), negativeattitudes (Berkowitz & Knurek, 1969), salient aggressive verbal-izations (Loew, 1967), and unpleasant physical characteristicsof the target of aggression (Berkowitz & Frodi, 1979) have alsobeen shown to increase aggression.

The purpose of the present article was threefold. First, thereliability of any tendency for weapons, as well as of cues ingeneral, to increase aggressiveness was assessed by means ofmeta-analysis. Effect-size estimates corresponding to the signeddifference in aggressiveness between a negatively aroused (e.g.,angered) experimental group exposed to an aggression cue (e.g.,a gun) and an otherwise identical group not exposed to such acue comprised the focus of the analysis. In Study 2, we exam-ined potential mediators of the relationship between situational

622

SITUATIONAL AGGRESSION CUES 623

cues and the level of aggression exhibited by negatively arousedsubjects. Within each experiment studied, the contextual levelsof potentially relevant mediating variables were assessed andcorrelated with the cue-facilitated aggression effect sizes. Study3 paralleled Study 2 except that mediators of cue-facilitated ag-gression in neutral mood subjects was examined.

Study 1: Meta-Analysis of the Effects of Aggression CuesWhen Negative Affect Is Present

Because of frequent failures to replicate the weapons effect,and because outcomes opposite to the predicted direction ofeffect are fairly common (e.g., Buss etal., 1972; Ellis etal, 1971;Fischer, Kelm, & Rose, 1969; Page & Scheldt, 1971; Turner,Layton, & Simons, 1975, Study 3), the overall nature of the rela-tionship between cues and aggression is not yet fully resolved.To address this issue more definitively, we gathered and ana-lyzed separately data for negative-affect experimental condi-tions that featured (a) the entire range of negative cues, includ-ing both weapons and other varieties of aggression cues; (b) onlyname-mediated aggression cues (i.e., instances in which the tar-get of measured aggression bore a name that had been experi-mentally associated with pain, unpleasantness, or violence); (c)only the presence of weapons; (d) the presence of weaponsamong subjects who exhibited high levels of either hypothesisawareness or evaluation apprehension; and (e) the presence ofweapons among subjects who exhibited neither a high level ofhypothesis awareness nor a high degree of evaluation apprehen-sion. Within each of these categories, descriptive effect-size sta-tistics were calculated, and an overall test of the obtained rela-tionship was undertaken.

Method

Qualifying observations consisted of cases in which, among individu-als exposed to a negative event, it was possible to calculate an effect-size estimate corresponding to the difference in aggressiveness resultingfrom exposure to an environmental cue associated with either violenceor general unpleasantness. Studies in which subjects were shown onlyan aggressive film clip were excluded from analysis to preserve the dis-tinction between the effect of a general prior viewing of violence and theeffect of a specific cue manifest at the time of the aggressive act. Eachvolume of each of the following journals was exhaustively scanned tolocate potentially relevant studies: Journal of Personality and SocialPsychology, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Personality andSocial Psychology Bulletin, Social Psychology Quarterly, Journal of Ap-plied Social Psychology, European Journal of Social Psychology, andAggressive Behavior. The reference sections of qualifying studies wereexamined for further citations; this process was repeated until no newstudies were found. Studies that featured individuals under 15 years ofage, drugs, alcohol, or exposure to any positive affect-inducing eventwere excluded because of their potential noncomparability with the re-mainder of the sample.

Each separate comparison between a negative-affect group exposedto an aggression or unpleasant cue and a negative-affect control group(unexposed to a cue) was treated as a separate observation in the analy-sis. When multiple negative-affect control groups were present within asingle study, the one most similar to the particular experimental cuecondition in question was used as the basis of comparison. For example,the particular negative-affect group differing only by virtue of being un-exposed to a cue was used as the control group against which to gaugethe effect of a given cue condition in factorial designs. In all, 57 separatecue-present versus cue-absent comparisons, arising from 23 separate

studies, formed the basis of the meta-analysis. For each observation inthe meta-analysis Table 1 lists the underlying citation, the particularexperimental and control groups studied, the dependent measure, andthe effect-size estimate.

Slightly more than one half of the observations featured a weapon asthe aggression cue. Other types of cues included name-mediated nega-tive associations (i.e., the name of the recipient of measured aggressionwas previously paired with negative or violent stimuli; e.g., Berkowitz& Knurek, 1969),' salient hostile verbalizations (Loew, 1967), the pres-ence of a bumper sticker with a hostile theme (Turner et al., 197 5), expo-sure to slides of weapons (Caprara, Renzi, Amolini, D'Imperio, & Tra-vaglia. 1984), unpleasant physical characteristics of the victim (Berko-witz & Frodi, 1979), and the donning of Ku Klux Klan-like clothing(Johnson & Downing, 1979). In the majority of cases, a manipulation ofanger constituted the negative-affect induction. Although the dependentmeasure usually was behavioral, typically consisting of shock adminis-tration, some of the studies used verbal and questionnaire measures.Elsewhere (Carlson, Marcus-Newhall, & Miller, 1989), we present evi-dence supporting the notion that these two types of response measuresassess a single underlying construct of aggression. In most cases, thetarget of measured aggression was a person who had previously pro-voked the subject.

Effect-size estimates were generally calculated by applying the formu-las described in Glass, McGaw, and Smith (1981). When the mean andstandard deviation were provided for both the aggression-cue experi-mental group and the no-cue control group, the pooled estimate of sam-ple standard deviation was used to calculate the effect-size estimate. Ina few cases, only the condition means along with the results of a multiplecomparison test were reported. If differences between eight or moremeans were simultaneously tested, the study was retained and an esti-mate of sample variance was derived by averaging the lowest and thehighest possible mean-squared error values that were capable of produc-ing the entire pattern of significance test results. An interval of possiblemean-squared error values was obtained by working backward to find(a) the largest possible mean-squared error value that could accountfor the hypothesis test result for the closest pair of means found to besignificantly different and (b) the smallest possible mean-squared errorvalue that could account for the hypothesis test result for the most dis-crepant pair of means not found to significantly differ. The midpoint ofthe interval was used to estimate the sample variance.

For the combined effect across all observations, as well as within rele-vant subcategories, the Stauffer method of cumulating z scores was usedto provide an overall significance test. A "fail-safe n" (Rosenthal, 1984)also was calculated within each category. The fail-safe n represents thenumber of relevant unreported hypothesis tests yielding a mean effectsize of zero that would need to exist to render the obtained cumulativemeta-analytic result nonsignificant.

Results and Discussion

Table 2 presents the basic descriptive effect-size statistics, aswell as the cumulative meta-analytic results, within each of thestudied categories. The notion that incidentally present nega-tive or aggression cues generally enhance aggressiveness amongindividuals already experiencing negative affect was stronglysupported. Both the median and mean effect size (.50 and .38,respectively) fell within the range of what Cohen (1977) de-

1 A case in which the recipient of measured aggression shared thesame name as a victorious fighter in a previously viewed film clip (Geen& Berkowitz, 1966) was omitted because of the possibility that the namewould produce positive affective associations (e.g., the authors specu-lated that the name may have stimulated thoughts of "hero" or "goodguy").

624 M. CARLSON, A. MARCUS-NEWHALL, AND N. MILLER

Table 1Citation, Experimental and Control Groups, Dependent Measure, and Effect-Size Estimate for the Set of Cue-Based Observations

Citation

Berkowitz & Knurek,1969ac

Page & Scheidt, 1971,Exp. I1*

Page & Scheidt, 1971,Exp. 2"

Page & Scheidt, 1971,Exp. 3b

Page & Scheidt, 1971,Exp. 3b

Berkowitz & LePage,19671*

Berkowitz & LePage,1967*

Berkowitz & Geen,1966ac

Berkowitz, 1965,Exp. 1"

Berkowitz, 1965,Exp. l"c

Berkowitz, 1965,Exp. 2"

Berkowitz, 1965,Exp. 2ac

Berkowitz, 1965,Exp. 3

Fraczek & Macaulay,1971"

Fraczek & Macaulay,I971a

Berkowitz & Geen,1967a

Berkowitz & Geen,1967"

Loew, 1967"c

Turner & Simons,1974"

Turner & Simons,1974





Boyanowski &Griffiths, 1982"c

Experimental condition

Negative name,frustration (n = 15)

7 shocks, weapons(n=15)

Weapons (n = 14)

Naive, weapons (n = 20)

Sophisticated, weapons(« = 22)

7 shocks, associatedweapons (n = 15)

7 shocks, unassociatedweapons (n =15)

Aggressive film, angered,Kirk(«= 11)

Anger, neutral film,boxer (n = 7)

Anger, boxing film,boxer (n = 7)

Anger, neutral film,boxer(« = 1 1)

Anger, aggressive film,boxer (n = 11)

Angered, boxer role, lessjustified («= 11)

High emotionality, gunspresent (n = 10)

Low emotionality, gunspresent (n = 10)

Justified film aggression,Kirk(« = 15)

Less justified filmaggression, Kirk( « = 1 5 )

Hostile, interdependent(n = 20)

Low subjectsophistication, lowevaluationapprehension (n = 11)

Medium subjectsophistication, lowevaluationapprehension (n - 11)

High subjectsophistication, lowevaluationapprehension (n = 11)

Low subjectsophistication, highevaluationapprehension (« = 11)

Medium subjectsophistication, highevaluationapprehension (n = 11)

High subjectsophistication, highevaluationapprehension (n = 11)

Negative, gun (n = 33)d

Control condition

Neutral name,frustration (n = 15)

7 shocks, no weapons(«=15)

No weapons (n = 14)

Naive, no weapons( « = 1 2 )

Sophisticated, noweapons (n = 11)

7 shocks, no object(«=15)

7 shocks, no object(«=15)

Aggressive film, angered,Bob(«= 11)

Anger, neutral film,speech major (n = 7)

Anger, boxing film,speech major (n = 7)

Anger, neutral film,speech major (n = 11)

Anger, aggressive film,speech major (n = 11)

Angered, speech majorrole, less justified(/!= 11)

High emotionality, noguns present (n = 8)

Low emotionality, noguns present (n = 10)

Justified film aggression,Bob(rc= 15)

Less justified filmaggression, Bob(«= 15)

Nonhostile,interdependent(n = 20)

No weapons (n = 1 1 )

No weapons (n =11)

No weapons (« = 11)

No weapons (n = 11)

No weapons (n = 11)

No weapons (n = 11)

Negative, no gun(n = 33)

Dependent variable

Personality evaluationand rating of behavior

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Questionnaire, criticalexperimenter

Questionnaire, criticalexperimenter

Number and durationof shocks


Number and durationof shocks, hostilityratings



Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Intensity and durationof shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Expression of anger

Effect size

.94

-.15

-.84

-.66

.87

1.06

.76

1.28

-.41

1.76

.18

1.01

1.39

-1.01

1.69

.47

.25

.55

.64

.08

-.53

-.27

-.62

-1.17

.71


Table 1 (continued)

Citation

Swart & Berkowitz,19761"

Johnson & Downing,1979"

Johnson & Downing,1979"

Turner, Layton, &Simons, 1975,Exp. 2*

Turner, Layton, &Simons, 1975,Exp. 2"

Turner, Layton, &Simons, 1975,Exp. 3

Turner, Layton &Simons, 1975,Exp. 3"

Turner, Layton, &Simons, 1975,Exp. 3"

Buss, Booker, & Buss,1972, Exp. 51*

Buss, Booker, & Buss,1972, Exp. 6 b

CapraraetaL, 1984"°

Capraraetal., 1984"

Geen & Berkowitz,1966"

Geen & Berkowitz,1966s

Geen & Berkowitz,1967K

Geen & Berkowitz,1967"

Berkowitz & Frodi,1979, Exp. l'c

Berkowitz & Frodi,1979, Exp. 2a

Berkowitz & Frodi,1979, Exp. 2"

Frodi, 1975ac

Fischer, Kelm, &Rose, 1969*

Fischer, Kelm, &Rose, 1969ac

Fischer, Kelm, &Rose, 1969

Simons & Turner,1976"

Simons & Turner,1976



Provoked, pain cues,conditioned (n = 10)

Individuated, antisocialcue(n = 15)

Deindividuated,antisocial cue( n = 1 5 )

Low visibility, rifle,vengeance bumpersticker (n= 17)

High visibility, rifle,vengeance bumpersticker (n = 14)

No rifle, vengeancebumper sticker(« = 49)

Rifle, no bumper sticker(n = 52)

Rifle, vengeance bumpersticker (« = 50)

7 shocks, weaponspresent (n = 15)

7 shocks, weaponspresent (n = 15)

Instigation, highirritability, aggressiveslides (n = 20)

Instigation, lowirritability, aggressiveslides (n = 20)

Boxing film, Kelley(n=15)

Boxing film, Kirk(»=15)

Boxing film, frustration,Kirk (n = 9)

Boxing film, insult, Kirk(n = 9)

Provocation,unattractive (n = 14)

All trials, unattractive,normal speech(n = 10)

All trials, unattractive,stutterer (n = 10)

7 shocks, aggressionenhancing stimuli(n = 20)

Stress, switchblade knife(n = 8)

Stress, carving knife(n = 8)

Stress, table knife(n = 8)

Low evaluationapprehension, lowhypothesis awareness,weapons (n = 7)

Low evaluationapprehension, highhypothesis awareness,weapons (n = 8)

High evaluationapprehension, lowhypothesis awareness,weapons (n = 8)

Control condition

Provoked, pain cues,neutral (n = 10)

Individuated, prosocialcue(n= 15)

Deindividuated,prosocial cue (n = 15)

Low visibility, control(n = 15)

High visibility, control(n = 14)

No rifle, no bumpersticker (n = 49)



7 shocks, no weaponspresent (n = 15)

7 shocks, no weaponspresent (n = 15)

Instigation, highirritability, no slides(n = 20)

Instigation, lowirritability, no slides(n = 20)

Boxing film, Riley(»=15)

Boxing film, Riley( n = 1 5 )

Boxing film, frustration,Bob(n = 9)

Boxing film, insult, Bob(n = 9)

Provocation, attractive(n = 14)

All trials, attractive,normal speech(n = 10)

All trials, attractive,normal speech(n = 10)

7 shocks, control(n = 10)

Stress, no object control(« = 8)



Low evaluationapprehension, lowhypothesis awareness,no weapons (n = 9)

Low evaluationapprehension, highhypothesis awareness,no weapons (n = 6)

High evaluationapprehension, lowhypothesis awareness,no weapons (n = 7)

Dependent variable

Shock intensity

Shock intensity

Shock intensity

Horn honking

Horn honking

Horn honking

Horn honking

Horn honking

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Intensity of shocks

Intensity of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Intensity of shocks

Intensity of shocks

Intensity of shocks

Intensity of noise

Intensity of noise

Number of shocks

Evaluation scores

Evaluation scores

Evaluation scores

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Effect size

.44'

1.10

2.41

1.16

.62

-.52

-.52

-.39

-.87

.00

1.5lr

1.04f

.82

.71

.53

.65

1.10

.79

1.31

.91

-.63

-.44

-.27

1.20

-.08

-.17

(table continues)


Table 1 (continued)

Citation


Ellis, Weiner, &Miller, 1971 ac

Ellis, Weiner, &Miller, 1971"




High evaluationapprehension, highhypothesis awareness,weapons (n = 7)

8 shocks, student,weapons present(71=13)

8 shocks, police,weapons associated(71= 13)

Reward, aggressive cuepresent (n = 10)

Not treated, aggressivecue present (n = 10)

Control condition

High evaluationapprehension, highhypothesis awareness,no weapons (n = 8)

8 shocks, student,weapons absent(«=13 )

8 shocks, police,weapons absent(71 = 13)

Reward, aggressive cueabsent (n= 10)

Not treated, aggressivecue absent (n = 10)

Dependent variable

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of shocks

Number of stressfulnoises

Number of stressfulnoises

Effect size

-.68

.36

-.80

1.52

.45

* Observation included in Study 2. b Condition collapsed with other cases to form a single observation in Study 2. c Corresponding neutral-moodcue observation included in Study 3. d Number of subjects per condition was not provided in the original report and was estimated by assumingequal numbers per cell. e Standard deviation estimate was based on the square root of the within-subject error term. f Standard deviation estimateis based on the square root of the MSe term for the entire analysis.

scribed as a medium degree of effect. The aggression-enhancingtendency of cues is highly reliable (p < .0001), and the resultingfail-safe n of 628 is clearly large enough to rule out publicationbias as an explanation of the overall result. Of course, this overalleffect is specific to the conditions that characterized the sampledstudies. For instance, in most of the sampled studies, the negativeaffect that was present resulted from an induction of anger.

A strong, positive result also was present for the category con-taining name-mediated associations. In such instances, the tar-get of aggressiveness was an individual whose name had pre-viously been paired with an unpleasant outcome (e.g., condi-tioned to unpleasant adjectives; Berkowitz & Knurek, 1969) orwith an aggressive encounter (e.g., the victim of a brutal beatingin a fight scene; Berkowitz & Geen, 1967). On the average, thepresence of such cues was associated with slightly over twothirds of a standard deviation of increased aggression.

Among the entire set of instances featuring only weapons ascues, a nonsignificant, near-zero average effect-size value was

obtained. This outcome resulted, however, from the opposingor cancelling effects of weapons among two different types ofsubjects. Among subjects whose hypothesis awareness or evalu-ation apprehension was specifically elevated by an experimentalmanipulation or as a natural occurrence, as determined by apost-session interview, the presence of weapons tended to in-hibit aggression. In contrast, the presence of weapons enhancedthe aggression of nonapprehensive or less suspicious individu-als. In both cases, the fail-safe n seems acceptable even thoughit is low. In this context, a low fail-safe n is less meaningful thanusual because failures to confirm the weapons effect were pub-lishable out of concern over its genuineness (e.g., Buss et al.,1972; Ellis etal., 1972; Page &Scheidt, 1971).

To the extent that experimental demand is most stronglypresent when suspicion is high, this interactive effect betweenthe presence of weapons as cues and subject sophistication runscounter to Page and Scheldt's (1971) contention that the weap-ons effect is due to demand characteristics contained in the ex-

Table 2Effect-Size Descriptive Statistics, Cumulative Z Values, and Fail-Safe nsfor Selected Categories of Cue Effects

Category N Mdn M SD Stauffer Z Fail-safe TV

All observations combinedName-mediated cuesExposure to weapons

OverallLow subject

sophistication andevaluationapprehension

High subjectsophistication orevaluationapprehension

568

31

22

9

.50

.68

-.08

.49

-.53

.38

.71

.10

.31

-.39

.83

.32

.82

.83

.58

5.75**4.63**

1.27

3.03*

-2.39*

62856

—

53

11

Note. Mdn = median.*p<.05. **/><. 0001.


perimental setting. Instead, the most parsimonious interpreta-tion is that when an experiment does show a weapons effect,it occurs despite the presence of any subjects who experiencesuspiciousness or evaluation apprehension (Berkowitz & Don-nerstein, 1982; Simons & Turner, 1976; Turner & Simons,1974). As Berkowitz and Donnerstein (1982) suggested, aggres-sion is generally frowned upon in American society. Therefore,subjects who are aware of what is being tested or who want tomake a favorable impression will tend to display less aggression.This interpretation is consistent, for instance, with contempo-rary views of modern racism, which point to similar sources ofreluctance to display overt, public hostility toward members ofminority groups (e.g., Gaertner & Dovidio, 1986; McConahay,1986).2

Study 2: Mediators of the Effects of CuesWhen Negative Affect Is Present

The results of the preceding analysis suggest that, in general,situational cues do indeed facilitate aggressiveness in individu-als who previously have been made to feel unpleasant. The stan-dard deviation for effect size (.83) was fairly large, however, sug-gesting that additional variables substantially moderate the in-fluence of situational cues on aggression. No single theoryprovides a set of moderators that are applicable to the studiesof cue-based aggression and that form a coherent, interrelatednetwork of relationships. Therefore, we examined seven moder-ators that seemed potentially relevant on a priori grounds. Formost of them, different theoretical orientations can be applied,resulting in rival predictions.

Anger

Berkowitz (1974, 1983) proposed that situational cues mostspecifically enhance impulsively expressed aggression. In con-trast to more deliberate or instrumental forms of hostile re-sponding, impulsive aggression is relatively involuntary and hasas its ultimate goal the infliction of harm. Negative events thatstimulate high levels of anger are likely to produce impulsiveaggression and might therefore be expected to heighten cueeffects. On the other hand, to the extent that high levels of angergenerate increased anxiety about the consequences of aggres-sively lashing out, cues may also increase apprehensivenessabout acting aggressively (e.g., Fraczek & Macaulay, 1971).Such inhibiting effects might be particularly likely in laboratorysettings, where the norms that constrain the impulsive expres-sion of aggression are likely to be salient and operative. Subjectsknow that an experimenter is present and that their behaviorwill be observed or recorded. Thus, to the degree that increasesin anger both (a) enhance automatic, nondeliberate informationprocessing, which should augment cue effects, and (b) heightenaggression anxiety, which should oppose the effect of cues, thefacilitating effects of cues may be approximately independentof the degree of anger.

Directness of Aggression (Displacement)

A person is likely to be angrier when confronting a previousprovocateur than when confronting an innocent bystander.Thus, as was predicted for impulsive anger, higher levels of ag-

gression ought to be displayed toward a provocateur than to-ward an innocent other. On the other hand, to the degree thatanxiety about aggression typically is aroused in the laboratorysettings wherein studies of cue-mediated aggression have beenconducted, the same cancelling effects described for impulsiveanger might also hold, yielding similar levels of direct and dis-placed aggression. Finally, to the extent that the stimulus gener-alization slopes for approach (aggressive behavior) and avoid-ance (aggression anxiety) responses do differ in steepness (withthe latter being steeper), greater cue-based aggressive respond-ing might be expected toward an innocent bystander than to-ward the instigator of aggression (Miller, 1959). This model,however, seems more appropriate for settings in which fear ofretaliation from the target of aggression is a legitimate concern.In the studies selected for analysis, the research paradigmsmake it unlikely that such concerns were salient to the subjects.Consequently, its applicability here may be questionable.

Cognitive Considerations

Target-based facilitation and harm capacity of the aggressiveresponse. In addition to their potential interaction with emo-tional processes, aggressive cues may function independently ina cognitive sense by priming aggression-related thoughts andimages. Leventhal (1980) proposed that negative feeling statesare associated with affectively consistent schemata. To the ex-tent that aggression-facilitating schematic processing is alreadyoccurring at the time aggressive cues are encountered, theireffectiveness should be increased. Likewise, inhibitory consid-erations that reduce the ease of maintaining an aggressive re-sponse set may mitigate cue effects. Therefore, in an explana-tion of cue-facilitated aggression based on priming, the effec-tiveness of cues ought to be maximal (other things equal) whenthe confluence of contextual features facilitates an uninhibited,cognitively simple expression of aggression.

One such situational consideration concerns the target of ex-pressed aggression. When the target is an outgroup member orpossesses diminished social status, inhibitory considerationsmay be minimized, and a pro-aggressive response set may bemore readily primed. In addition, aggressive acts that are espe-cially harmful to the recipient will be the ones most consistentwith pro-aggression schemata and should therefore be posi-tively associated with cue facilitation effects.

As noted, however, relatively harmful acts may stimulate ei-ther anti-aggressive norms or anxiety about aggressing andthereby fail to produce cue-facilitation effects. Nevertheless, be-cause the operation of a pro-aggression response set tends tominimize the saliency of anti-aggressive cognitions, such damp-ening effects are likely to be considerably weaker than those pro-duced by high levels of anger.

Judgmental complexity of the aggressive act. Aggressive actsdiffer in the amount of prior conscious deliberation upon whichthey are based. Thus, some aggressive acts are undertakenrather spontaneously, without careful consideration of their ad-

2 This positive conclusion regarding the genuineness of the weaponseffect is congruent with the results of a field experiment conducted bySimons etal. (1975, cited in Turner etal., 1977), in which the incidentalpresence of weapons heightened aggressiveness among subjects whowere unaware that they were being studied.


vantages and disadvantages, whereas other aggressive acts areassociated with more judgmental complexity in terms of theamount of thinking that precedes them. The priming notionseems to suggest that, when a high degree of judgmental com-plexity is involved in deciding how much to aggress, the contri-bution of situational cues will be reduced. Thus, conscious de-liberation may interfere with and thereby reduce the effects ofmore automatic considerations, such as cue-based primingeffects. It is possible, however, that rationally based aggressive-ness and automatic hostile responding may operate indepen-dently rather than inversely.

Cue Salience and Cue Relevance to Victim

Two further considerations pertain to cue salience and vic-tim-cue specificity. More noticeable or psychologically impact-ful cues, as well as cues associated specifically with the victim(e.g., name-mediated associations), may produce higher levelsof aggression than cues that lack such features.

Method

To test the preceding notions, we regressed a set of cue-based effect-size estimates onto the set of mediating predictor variables. Partial cor-relation coefficients were then calculated to provide an assessment ofwhether each variable in question independently mediates the effect ofaggression cues on level of aggressive responding.

The bulk of the meta-analytic sample of observations described inStudy 1, along with the corresponding effect-size estimates, was used forStudy 2. Whereas in Study 1 subsets of cue varieties were examinedseparately, in Study 2 observations stemming from different cue typeswere combined into a single set to maximize power. This is justifiedbecause the mean effect sizes of the subsets that were combined (viz., thesubsets featuring name-mediated cues, weapons among subjects withneither high hypothesis awareness nor elevated evaluation apprehen-sion, and cues comprised neither of weapons nor name-mediated asso-ciations), did not differ, F(2, 37) = 1.06, p > .35, which implies thatvariables other than type of cue mediate the variation in effect sizes.

As indicated, however, the set was altered in several ways to improveits suitability for testing the effects of potential mediator variables. First,the nine instances featuring suspicious or apprehensive subjects wereomitted because reduced aggression was displayed by such subjects.Given the artifactual decrease of aggression in these studies, their inclu-sion cannot contribute to an understanding of variables that might me-diate increases in naturally occurring aggression.

Second, a pair of single observations was generated separately for theassociated and unassociated weapons conditions first studied by Ber-kowitz and LePage (1967). Each original condition was combined withall corresponding exact replication attempts. The effect size of thesecollapsed observations was made equal to the effect-size mean of thecontributing instances. (Because exact replications were attempted, thelevels of each of the relevant mediating variables across this subset ofstudies were the same as in the original Berkowitz and LePage study.)This strategy was used to reduce the statistical dependency problemsthat would result from treating a large number of essentially identicalconditions as separate observations.

Third, to control for sample-size bias, effect-size estimates were cor-rected by applying the adjustment recommended by Hedges (cited inGlass et al., 1981). A total of 40 observations, arising from 18 separatepublications, were analyzed. Within this set of 40 cases, the search formediator variables was justified by rejection of the null hypothesis ofeffect-size homogeneity using Rosenthal's (1984) suggested test, x2(39,jV=40)= 146.15, p<. 0001.

Seven variables—anger, directness of aggression, target-based facilita-

tion, harm capacity of aggression, judgmental complexity, cue salience,and cue relevance to victim—were assessed as potential mediators ofcue-enhanced aggressiveness. The definition, possible and observedscale range, and frequency distribution or mean and standard deviationof each predictor, along with illustrative cases of high and low observa-tions, are provided in Table 3.

Cue relevance to victim is a dichotomous variable corresponding towhether or not the aggressive cue was specifically linked to the target ofaggression (e.g., the victim bears a name that has been experimentallyassociated with aggression, or is said to own a weapon that is present).Directness of aggression refers to retaliatory versus displaced aggressiveresponding. In some instances, the experimental situation featured anopportunity for the subject to aggress against the same person whocaused his or her negative affect (direct or retaliatory aggression),whereas in other instances, the dependent measure consisted of theamount of aggression directed against an innocent party (displaced ag-gression). Target-based facilitation reflects the degree to which the vic-tim of measured aggression possessed background characteristics thatfacilitated aggression by the subject. It was defined as the sum of twovictim characteristics: social status relative to the subject (1 = victim isof lower social status; 0 = victim is of equal social status; -1 = victimis of higher social status) and outgroup membership (1 = victim is out-group member; 0 = victim is not an outgroup member). For each ofthese three dichotomous variables (cue relevance to victim, directnessof aggression, and target-based facilitation), it was possible to objectivelycode their values on the basis of explicit information provided in themethod sections of the original articles.3

Four continuous variables also were included as potential predictorsof cue-based effect-size estimates. Anger was defined as the extent towhich the negative affect manipulation tended to induce anger in theexperimental subjects. Cue salience corresponds to the degree to whichthe aggressive cue was psychologically salient to subjects. For example,an unexpected collection of hand grenades sitting on a table directly infront of a subject would be highly salient, whereas a bumper sticker withan aggressive theme on a motor vehicle located 100 ft away would bemuch less salient. Harm capacity pertains to the particular dependentmeasure of aggression studied by the experimenter and was defined as"the degree to which high levels of aggression would ostensibly hurt ordo damage to the target of the aggressive act." For example, the ostensi-bly extreme shocks elicited by the experimenter in Milgram's (1965)classic studies on obedience would reflect a high degree of harm capac-ity, whereas depriving a fellow subject of 5C on a reward allocation mea-sure would not. Finally, we defined judgmental complexity as "the ex-tent to which the aggressive act is based on a complex judgment, asopposed to being nonthinking or undeliberate." It refers to cognitivereflection versus impulsivity. Values on this variable are high when it isnecessary to combine multiple or complex sources of information toarrive at a decision about how much to aggress (such as preceded theU.S. bombing of Libya); spontaneous, cognitively simple aggressive actsare low in judgmental complexity (as when one instinctively swats a bugthat is crawling on one's arm).

Values for each of the four continuous variables were obtained byhaving independent judges make ratings after reading the method sec-tions of the underlying studies. The rating procedure was similar to thatused in our previous investigations of the relation between mood andhelping behavior (Carlson & Miller, 1987; Carlson, Charlin, & Miller,1988). Each judge was provided with a complete set of xeroxed, de-tached, separately randomly ordered method sections corresponding toeach distinctly different condition (exact replications were rated onlyonce), with the relevant portions (i.e., descriptions of the negative affectinduction, presentation of the aggressive cue, and opportunity for thesubject to aggress) highlighted. When rating each variable, the judges

3 Values on these three variables were coded by Michael Carlson, whowas unaware of the effect-size estimates when performing the task.


Table 3Definition, Exemplary Cases, and Possible and Observed Scale Ranges for Each of the Predictor Variables and Effect Size

Variable Definition Example of case with high value Example of case with low valuePossible

rangeObserved

range

Anger

Cue relevanceto victim

Cue salience

Directness ofaggression

Harmcapacity oftheaggressiveresponse

Judgmentalcomplexity

Target-basedfacilitation

Effect size

The extent to which feelingsof anger would resultfrom exposure to thenegative event.

Whether or not the victim ofmeasured aggression wasspecifically associatedwith the aggressive cue.

The extent to which the cuewas noticeable orpsychologically impactfulto the subjects.

Whether or not the victim ofmeasured aggression wasthe cause of the priornegative event.

The degree to which highlevels of aggression wouldostensibly hurt or damagethe victim.

The extent to which theaggressive act is based ona complex judgment, asopposed to beingnonthinking orundeliberate.

The extent to which thevictim of measuredaggression was anoutgroup member or oflower social status thanthe subject.

The standardized extent towhich, among subjectsexperiencing negativeaffect, cues influencedaggressiveness.

While attempting to solve afrustrating puzzle, subjectswere repeatedly insulted byan obnoxious fellowparticipant in the experiment(Geen & Berkowitz, 1967:insult condition).

Subjects administered electricshocks to an individual whohad the same name as theactor whom they had justseen receive a beating in afilmed fight scene (Berkowitz& Geen, 1966: Kirkcondition).

Three pistols, a blackjack, and aknife (next to a sign statingthat the weapons were not tobe removed from the room)were in the immediatepresence of subjects duringthe opportunity to aggress(Ellis, Weiner, & Miller, 1971:weapons present condition).

The dependent measure ofaggression consisted of anopportunity to administerelectric shocks to the sameperson who previouslyshocked the subjectexcessively (Frodi, 1975).

Subjects, on a questionnaire,made negative ratings of anexperimenter whoconceivably could hurt hisgraduate career (Berkowitz,1965).

Acting in the hypothetical roleof a parent assisting her childwith her homework, femaleundergraduates deliveredbursts of noise to a 10-year-old girl after discovering thatthe child made 10 errors on alearning task (Berkowitz &Frodi, 1979: Experiment 1).

Female students aggressedagainst a paid, nonstudentmale volunteer who hadpreviously behaved in adistasteful manner in aninterview (Johnson &Downing, 1979).

Subjects were the recipient of 3-27two independent negativepersonality evaluations(Fischer, Kelm, & Rose,1969).

Subjects were exposed to 0 = no,weapons that were said to 1 = yesbelong to someone otherthan the target of aggression(Berkowitz & LePage, 1967:unassociated weaponscondition).

The aggressive cue consisted of 2-18a bumper sticker featuringthe word vengeance on amotor vehicle at a stoplightin front of the subject's car(Turner, Layton, & Simons,1975: Study 3).

Following the receipt of a 0 = no,negative personal evaluation 1 = yesmade by anotherexperimental participant,subjects were given anopportunity to aggressagainst a 10-year-old child(Berkowitz & Frodi, 1979).

Near the end of the 3-27experiment, subjects madenegative questionnaireratings, which would be seenonly by the experimenterand, at a later time, by acoparticipant in the study(Berkowitz & Knurek,1969).

Subjects honked their horn at a 2-18driver in front of them whofailed to move his vehicleforward after a signal turnedgreen (Turner, Layton, &Simons, 1975).

Undergraduate males -1 to 2 b

aggressed against a fellowstudent (Loew, 1967).

3-18(11.8,3.7)"

0(«= 16) to1 (n = 24)

6-17(11.7,3.6)"

0(n= 13)to1 ( n = 27)

3-21(13.3,4.6)"

2-18(13.7,3.8)"

2(n = 2),1 (n = 10),0 (n = 27),

-0.92-2.28(.54, .73)"

" Mean and standard deviation. b 2 = outgroup and lower status; 1 = one of the above; 0 = neither of the above, or higher status and outgroupmember; -1 = not outgroup member but higher status.


Table 4Zero-Order and Higher Order Partial Correlation CoefficientsBetween Each Predictor Variable and Effect SizeAmong Negative Affect Conditions

Variable

AngerDirectness of aggressionTarget-based facilitationHarm capacity of the

aggressive responseJudgmental complexityCue salienceCue relevance to victim

Zero-orderr(38)

-.19-.06

.38*

.34*

.26

.01-.06

Higher order partialK32)

-.06-.11

.44**

.40**

.09

.02

.00

*p<.05. **p<.OL

referred to a form that provided a definition of the construct, as well as anumerical, directionally labelled rating scale listing the range of possiblevalues. Prior to making any ratings, each judge was given a descriptionof the rating task, including a brief review of the definition and scaledirection of each variable. Judges rated the entire set of cases for eachgiven variable before moving to the next variable. Three judges ratedanger and harm capacity, whereas two judges rated cue salience andjudgmental complexity. The Spearman-Brown reliability values of thefour variables were as follows: anger, .75; harm capacity, .88; judgmentalcomplexity, .95; and cue salience, .79.4 All judges were blind to the out-comes of the rated studies.


As a set, the seven predictor variables accounted for 17% ofthe effect-size variability (adjusted R2 = . 17, p < .07). The zero-order and higher order partial correlations between each predic-tor variable and effect size is given in Table 4.

Anger and Directness of Aggression

Study 1 showed that the presence of aggression cues aug-mented aggressive responding by subjects in whom a negativeemotional state had previously been induced. In the studiessampled, anger was by far the negative state most commonlyinduced. In this analysis, we were concerned with whether thelevel of induced anger moderates the weapons effect. As seen inTable 4, cue effects were nonsignificantly lower when higher lev-els of anger were present. This result, along with the absence ofan effect for the directness of aggression, counters the notionthat situational cues specifically augment angry or impulsiveaggression. As noted earlier, however, aggression anxiety andother normative constraints may be more likely to disrupt ag-gressive responding in laboratory situations than in more natu-ral settings. This may in part underlie the failure of higher levelsof anger to increase susceptibility to the effect of aggressioncues.

Nevertheless, the fact that suitable cues commonly heightenaggressiveness, even in the face of seemingly low levels of anger,implies that their effects are not specific to the expression ofimpulsive, angry aggression. For example, in one study (Ca-prara et al., 1984), subjects made to feel bad by being told thattheir performance was below average on a verbal task were later

given an opportunity to shock an experimental confederate. Al-though it seems unlikely that the resulting level of aggressionwas highly impulsive or passionate, prior exposure to slides ofweapons nonetheless facilitated aggression. Exposure to theslides also increased the aggressiveness of neutral-affect controlsubjects. Thus, cues do not augment only anger-based aggres-sion.

Target-Based Facilitation and Harm Capacityof the Aggressive Response

The facilitating effects of cues were stronger when lower statustargets or outgroup members were the victims, as well as whenthe aggressive action was more likely to harm the victim. Theseresults are consistent with the view that situational cues primea pro-aggression response set already present when aggressionbegins.

The difference in outcomes obtained for directness of aggres-sion and target-based facilitation warrants some comment. Inone sense, they seem to tap a common underlying notion,namely, the deservingness of the victim. From this perspective,just as the perpetrator of hostility is more deserving of a person'swrath than an innocent bystander, so too might lower statusindividuals who offend or anger a person be seen as deservingmore retaliation than individuals of equal or higher status. Ifthis is so, however, then why was a mediating effect found fortarget-based facilitation but not for directness of aggression?

In the case of directness of aggression (displacement), thecomparison was between a provocateur and a hapless bystander.For target-based facilitation, the comparison was between twoprovocateurs who, on the basis of their instigating action, wereequally deserving of retaliatory aggression. They differed interms of a social cue (status) that could be used to justify en-hanced retaliation. Thus, for target-based facilitation, it was theconfluence of situational cues (weapons and the low social sta-tus of the target) that augmented aggressive responding. Bothof these cue effects seem to be primarily perceptual or cognitivein nature. On the other hand, the best way to conceptualize theeffect of directness of aggression may be in terms of the level ofanger or arousal elicited by the sight of the provocateur com-pared to the innocent bystander, and not in terms of their rela-tive deservingness. This would explain why directness of aggres-sion, like anger, failed to moderate the effect of aggressive cues.

The facilitating effect of harm capacity of the aggressive re-sponse can also be interpreted in this way. A response categoryor mode has stimulus as well as response functions. Thus, apotentially harmful response functions as another stimulus inthe aggression setting—a cognition that combines with othercues to augment aggression.

An alternative view of the effect of harm capacity is that anaggressive cue will move an angry subject beyond the boundary

4 The variables anger and harm capacity were rated by Don Carlson(an aerospace engineer), B. Ann Bettencourt (a social psychology gradu-ate student), and Michael Carlson. Cue salience and judgmental com-plexity were rated by Lisa Maybrown and Amy Marcus-Newhall, bothsocial psychology graduate students. All ratings were made withoutknowledge of the underlying effect sizes and without reference to theresults of the studies. For an extended description of the rating proce-dure, see Carlson (1988).


ordinarily created by normative constraints against aggressingonly when the aggressive act is high in functional value, that is,when it is perceived as being able to actually harm the target.In situations wherein the experimentally prescribed aggressiveaction is perceived as not producing much harm, the aggressivecue does not serve to augment aggressive responding. Thisthreshold notion implies an interaction of harm capacity withdirectness of aggression. When the experimentally prescribedresponse has a high capacity to harm, an aggressive cue, in com-bination with the sight of the person who instigated subjects'anger, might push them over the threshold. When combinedwith a response that cannot inflict much harm, however, the cueeffect is reduced.

Though the previously reported failure to obtain a correla-tion between directness of aggression and cue-based effect sizeargues to some degree against this line of reasoning, we explic-itly tested it by examining the interactions between harm capac-ity and level of anger and between harm capacity and directnessof aggression. As argued, the threshold notion implies that theaggression-enhancing effects of aggression cues should be facili-tated by an aggressive response high in harm capacity primarilyamong subjects whose level of anger is high. Subjects having ahigh level of anger are likely to be closer to the threshold foraggressive action than subjects who are only slightly angered.Consequently, the combined effects of the cue and a potentialaggressive response that is highly harmful are more likely topull highly angered subjects over the threshold.

Using a median split, we dichotomized cases into those inwhich subjects' level of anger was judged to be either low or high.When subjects' anger was low, the correlation between harmcapacity and cue-augmented effect sizes was .43 (p < .05).When subjects' anger was high, the correlation was -.07 (p >.50). A similar outcome was obtained in analyses of the interac-tion between harm capacity and directness of aggression. Whenthe target was the provocateur (n = 21), the harm capacity of theaggressive response was not significantly associated with cue-enhanced aggression (r = .20, p = .33); when the target was aninnocent bystander (n = 13), there was a strong positive associa-tion (r = .66, p = .014) between harm capacity and cue-en-hanced aggression.

These findings seem to counter a threshold effect. Such aneffect might operate exactly opposite to the theorizing describedabove, however. Specifically, it may be when anger is low or thetarget is a hapless bystander that the cue function of harm ca-pacity, in combination with other cues, pulls subjects over thethreshold for aggressive responding. In either case, however,these results support a cognitive interpretation of the associa-tion between harm capacity of the aggressive response and cueeffects. Cues combine with cognitions concerning harm capac-ity to increase aggression.

Judgmental Complexity

The absence of an inhibiting effect for the degree of judg-mental complexity may reflect an underlying independence be-tween the rational and the automatic processes that affect ag-gression. In other words, deliberate, reasoned aggressivenessmay additively coexist with irrational mechanisms, withoutdampening each other's effects. Such a conclusion is in har-mony with our previously published results (Carlson & Miller,

1988) suggesting that aggression-based equity restoration(which requires a cognitive judgment) and drive-based aggres-siveness (which is impulsive and automatic) are additive. Thedistinction made here is not between cognitive and noncogni-tive processes but rather is based on degree of automaticity.Though such variables as target-based facilitation and harm ca-pacity can be conceptualized as cognitive variables, when theirlevel is high the decision processes they invoke are likely to behighly automatic ones that do not require much elaborativethought. In contrast, judgmental complexity is a cognitive vari-able that at high levels implies extensive elaboration and littleautomaticity. Its apparent lack of interaction with situationalcues therefore suggests that the operation of cognitive processesdoes not cancel the impulsive component of aggression.

Cue Salience and Cue Relevance to the Victim

Neither the degree of cue salience nor the extent of cue rele-vance to the victim was associated with effect size. The nonsig-nificant result for cue salience may reflect the fact that, in thebulk of reported studies, cues were intentionally manipulatedto be noticeable to the subjects. Therefore, our negative resultfor cue salience may not generalize to a set of cases in whichsome cues were highly nonsalient.

Study 3: The Effects of Aggression CuesWhen Neutral Affect Is Present

The overall pattern of results obtained in Study 2 is consistentwith a cognitively based, priming interpretation of cue effects.Such an interpretation, if correct, suggests that aggression cuesshould generally have a facilitatory effect on aggression amongaffectively neutral individuals, in that priming processes per seare not dependent on the presence of negative affect. If sche-mata that are specifically mood- or emotion-based play a rolein cue-based aggression, however, as Berkowitz (1983) pro-posed, then the cue effects obtained under conditions of neutralmood ought to be less intense than those typically found whennegative affect is present. To the extent, however, that the cue-based priming of an aggressive response set does occur in thepresence of neutral mood, both target-based facilitation and theharm-engendering capacity of the aggressive response ought toaugment the effectiveness of the cues, as they did in the case ofnegative mood. To address these questions, we gathered cue-based effect-size estimates for a set of experimental conditionsfeaturing neutral mood.

Method

The sample of observations consisted of all cases within the set ofstudies listed in Table 1 in which the aggressiveness of neutral-moodsubjects exposed to an aggression or negative cue was compared withthat of neutral-mood subjects who were not exposed to a cue.5 A total of22 such instances was available. Values on two of the mediator variables,harm capacity of the aggressive response and target-based facilitation,were identical to those obtained in Study 2 in that they were unaffected

5 The determination of neutral-mood cases was rather straightfor-ward in that the experimental descriptions in the method sections re-vealed no clearly negative-mood inducing event, or the conditions wereconceptually treated as neutral by the authors), or both.


by the presence or absence of a prior mood manipulation. Moreover, inall 22 cases, an otherwise equivalent cue versus no-cue comparison waspresent for a set of negative mood subjects. These cases were includedas matched negative-mood observations to test whether the cue-basedfacilitation of aggression found under neutral-mood conditions is ofsmaller magnitude than that found under negative-mood conditions.

The effect-size estimates were first subjected to a meta-analysis to as-sess the overall relationship between cues and aggression among affec-tively neutral individuals. Potential moderators of the effect were thentested by means of correlation analyses. Finally, a paired t test was con-ducted to determine whether cue effects were stronger for negative orneutral mood.


The mean effect size was .20 (SD = .53; Mdn = .18) for the 22neutral-affect cue-based effect-size estimates. This cumulativeresult was significant (Stauffer Z = 2.31, p < .02, one-tailed).Thus, aggressive or negative cues increased aggressivenessamong individuals who were experiencing neutral affect.6

The results of partial correlation analyses revealed that, asin the case of negative mood, harm capacity of the aggressiveresponse, r(19) = .43, p < .05 (one-tailed), and target-based ag-gression facilitation, r(19) = .62, p < .002 (one-tailed), wereassociated with enhanced cue effects. These results were of thesame magnitude as those previously found for negative-moodconditions and are consistent with the priming interpretationof cue effects.7

Although neutral mood states were susceptible to the aggres-sion-enhancing effects of situational cues, the effect was smallerthan was found with negative mood. The results of a paired ttest showed that, among the 22 observations, the average effectsize was .40 units larger for the matched negative-affect condi-tions, t(2l) = 2.75, p < .01, one-tailed. The median effect-sizeadvantage for negative-mood cases was .26. This result impli-cates cognitive schemata specifically sensitive to negative moodas playing a facilitatory role in cue-enhanced aggressiveness, aswas proposed by Leventhal (1980).

Finally, the neutral-mood and negative-mood cue-basedeffect-size estimates correlated positively with each other,r(20) = .42, p < .03, one-tailed. This result implies that expo-sure to the same cue induced somewhat similar effects despitethe difference in affect. Thus, the underlying processes by whichcues operate share some common attributes that are indepen-dent of the presence of negative affect. Because affect was, atmost, not more than minimal in the neutral-mood conditions,we attribute this shared variance primarily to cognitive factorsthat enhance cue-based aggressiveness. Although it is possiblethat theoretically meaningless idiosyncratic features shared bythe individual conditions of each experimental study may par-tially underlie the correlation between negative- and neutral-mood cue effects, we do not think this explanation likely. Notethat the positive association reported above was based on a cor-relation between a set of cue-present effect sizes and a set of cue-absent effect sizes. To induce such a correlation artificially, suchdesign characteristics would have to interact with the presenceof cues and not merely enhance aggressiveness in general.

General Discussion

In conclusion, aggression-related cues present in experimen-tal settings act to increase aggressive responding. This cue effect

occurs more strongly when subjects have been negativelyaroused before their exposure to aggression-facilitating cues.The interaction between presence or absence of aggression cuesand previous negative arousal seems best interpreted in termsof priming processes that reactivate or maintain cognitive sche-mata initially activated by the negative arousal. The fact thatcue effects are not moderated by level of anger strengthens aninterpretation that emphasizes the role of cognitive factors. Forinstance, a drive or motivational account would require an ab-sence of effect without anger arousal, not merely a weaker effect.Such an account would also imply stronger effects as angerarousal increased.

Likewise, a learning theory interpretation that emphasizesthe guiding function of situational cues by viewing them as dis-criminative stimuli that signal imminent reward seems equallyinappropriate. A discriminative cue interpretation not only im-plies (a) stronger cue effects for higher levels of anger and (b) anabsence of cue effects for neutral affect, but also suggests that(c) cue effects for the mediating variables of target-based facili-tation and harm capacity of the aggressive act ought to bestronger among negative-affect cases than among neutral-affectcases. Although both of these mediating variables do affect themagnitude of cue effects, they do so irrespective of whether neg-ative affect has been previously aroused, as shown by the resultsof Study 3. For the neutral-affect cases (Study 3) the magnitudesof the partial correlations between each of these mediators andthe aggression-cue effect sizes were equal and nonsignificantlymore positive than the parallel correlations for the negative-affect cases (Study 2). In summary, then, we see aggression cueeffects as emphasizing the role of cognitive factors in the expres-sion of both impulsive and nonimpulsive aggression.

Psychologists' understanding of the process events that un-derlie cue-based enhancement of aggressive responding is tenta-tive. These three studies, in which we used focused comparisonsof subsets of cases and inferential judgments to assess variationacross studies in the contextual levels of potentially relevanttheoretical variables, have shed some light on the processes thatunderlie cue-enhanced aggression. Admittedly, however, muchof the interpretation of the results of the analyses is on softground. But now that these analyses establish cue-enhanced ag-gressiveness as a reliable finding, perhaps researchers will beginto study the cognitive processes involved by pursuing experi-mental work at the primary level.

6 Because the neutral-affect condition in nearly all cases was of sec-ondary interest to the purpose of the original studies, a fail-safe n wasnot calculated. To the extent that the publishability of a given study isindependent of the results obtained in neutral-mood conditions, publi-cation bias is a less meaningful consideration.

7 Because multiple conditions arising from the same experiment weretreated as separate observations in our analyses, it is conceivable thatthe significant results for the variables harm capacity and target-basedfacilitation are due to statistical dependencies. To assess this possibility,we tested the significant partial correlations obtained in Study 1 andStudy 2 by applying Tukey's jackknifing procedure (Glass et al., 1981).The resulting hypothesis tests were consistent with our prior conclu-sions for both negative (harm capacity, r = .55, p < .05, one-tailed;target-based facilitation, r = .62, p < .015, one-tailed) and neutral mood(harm capacity, r = .48, p < .02, one-tailed; target-based facilitation,r = .64, p < .001, one-tailed).


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Received January 3,1989Revision received November 13, 1989

Accepted November 13,1989 •

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