Abstract
The current study investigated the patterns of aggressive behavior displayed in a sample of 282 students in the 4th through 7th grades (M age = 11.28; SD = 1.82). Using cluster analyses, two distinct patterns of physical aggression emerged for both boys and girls with one aggressive cluster showing mild levels of reactive aggression and one group showing high levels of both reactive and proactive aggression. Both aggressive clusters showed problems with anger dysregulation, impulsivity, thrill and adventure seeking, positive outcome expectancies for aggression, and higher rates of bullying. However, the combined cluster was most severe on all of these variables and only the combined aggressive group differed from non-aggressive students on their level of callous-unemotional traits. Similar patterns of findings emerged for relational aggression but only for girls.
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Notes
The label relational aggression is sometimes used interchangeably with the terms “social aggression” and “indirect aggression (see Card et al., 2008 for a more extended discussion of the similarities and differences in the use of these terms). We chose to use the term “relational aggression” because the conceptualization that guided this study and the measure used to assess this construct in the current study focused on behaviors related to harming others through hurting their social relationships (e.g., spreading rumors and lies about another person; excluding others from a friendship group).
Given the relatively small sample size for the analyses, the results have to be interpreted with extreme caution. However, a confirmatory factor analysis was performed on the PCS in the current sample and the results were similar to past factor analyses. That is, the four factor structure showed adequate fit (e.g., CFI = .934; RMSEA = .063) and showed significantly better fit than one factor (i.e., general aggression) or two factor (i.e., relational and physical aggression factors) models using a chi-square difference test.
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Crapanzano, A.M., Frick, P.J. & Terranova, A.M. Patterns of Physical and Relational Aggression in a School-Based Sample of Boys and Girls. J Abnorm Child Psychol 38, 433–445 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-009-9376-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10802-009-9376-3