Dominance And Aggression In Humans And Other Animals

Dominance and Aggression in Humans and Other Animals: The Great Game of Life examines human nature and the influence of evolution, genetics, chemistry, nurture, and the sociopolitical environment as a way of understanding how and why humans behave in aggressive and dominant ways. The book walks us through aggression in other social species, compares and contrasts human behavior to other animals, and then explores specific human behaviors like bullying, abuse, territoriality murder, and war. The book examines both individual and group aggression in different environments including work, school, and the home. It explores common stressors triggering aggressive behaviors, and how individual personalities can be vulnerable to, or resistant to, these stressors. The book closes with an exploration of the cumulative impact of human aggression and dominance on the natural world. Reviews the influence of evolution, genetics, biochemistry, and nurture on aggression Explores aggression in multiple species, including insects, fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals Compares human and animal aggressive and dominant behavior Examines bullying, abuse, territoriality, murder, and war Includes nonaggressive behavior in displays of respect and tolerance Highlights aggression triggers from drugs to stress Discusses individual and group behavior, including organizations and nations Probes dominance and aggression in religion and politics Translates the impact of human behavior over time on the natural world

This book explores the role of aggression in primate social systems and its implications for human behavior. Many people look to primate studies to see if and how we might be able to predict violent behavior in humans, or ultimately to control war. Of particular interest in the study of primate aggression are questions such as: how do primates use aggression to maintain social organization; what are the costs of aggression; why do some primates avoid aggressive behavior altogether. Students and researchers in primatology, behavioral biology, anthropology, and psychology will read with interest as the editors and contributors to this book address these and other basic research questions about aggression. They bring new information to the topic as well as an integrated view of aggression that combines important evolutionary considerations with developmental, sociological and cultural perspectives.

In this work aggression and conflict in man and other primates are interpreted in the light of evolutionary biology and game theory models. Unitl now interdisciplinary collaboration between the humanities and the natural sciences has been rare and hampered by different methodologies and terminology. Nevertheless, such cooperation is essential for elucidating the causes and consequences of aggression in humans and in explaining what shape aggression takes in particular situations. The aim of this volume is to present empirical and theoretical studies from biologists and social scientists to create an interdisciplinary framework for understanding aggression.

When Men in Groups was first published in l969, the New York Times daily critic titled his review "The Disturbing Rediscovery of the Obvious." What was so obvious was male bonding, a phrase that entered the language. The links between males in groups Tiger describes extend through many other primate species, through our evolution as hunters/gatherers, and cross-culturally. Male bonding characterizes human groups as varied as the Vatican Council, the New York Yankees, the Elks and Masons the secret societies of Sierra Leone and Kenya.The power of Tiger's book is its identification of the powerful links between men and the impact of females and families on essentially male groups. While the world has changed much, the argument of the book and its new introduction by the author suggest that a species-specific pattern ofamale bonding continues to be part of the human default system. Perhaps one day concrete evidence of its location will emerge from the startling work on the human genome, just as the elaborate and consequential sex differences to which Men in Groups drew such pioneering attention have already become part of the common wisdom. Meanwhile, Men in Groups remains a measured andaresponsibleabut intrepid inspection of a major aspect of human social organization and personal behavior. The book was controversial when it first appeared, and often foolishly and unduly scorned. But it has remained a fundamental contribution to the emerging synthesis between the social and natural sciences.

This volume focuses on two questions: why do people from one social group oppress and discriminate against people from other groups? and why is this oppression so mind numbingly difficult to eliminate? The answers to these questions are framed using the conceptual framework of social dominance theory. Social dominance theory argues that the major forms of intergroup conflict, such as racism, classism and patriarchy, are all basically derived from the basic human predisposition to form and maintain hierarchical and group-based systems of social organization. In essence, social dominance theory presumes that, beneath major and sometimes profound difference between different human societies, there is also a basic grammar of social power shared by all societies in common. We use social dominance theory in an attempt to identify the elements of this grammar and to understand how these elements interact and reinforce each other to produce and maintain group-based social hierarchy.

The past 25 years have seen a major paradigm shift in the field of violence prevention, from the assumption that violence is inevitable to the recognition that violence is preventable. Part of this shift has occurred in thinking about why violence occurs, and where intervention points might lie. In exploring the occurrence of violence, researchers have recognized the tendency for violent acts to cluster, to spread from place to place, and to mutate from one type to another. Furthermore, violent acts are often preceded or followed by other violent acts. In the field of public health, such a process has also been seen in the infectious disease model, in which an agent or vector initiates a specific biological pathway leading to symptoms of disease and infectivity. The agent transmits from individual to individual, and levels of the disease in the population above the baseline constitute an epidemic. Although violence does not have a readily observable biological agent as an initiator, it can follow similar epidemiological pathways. On April 30-May 1, 2012, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Forum on Global Violence Prevention convened a workshop to explore the contagious nature of violence. Part of the Forum's mandate is to engage in multisectoral, multidirectional dialogue that explores crosscutting, evidence-based approaches to violence prevention, and the Forum has convened four workshops to this point exploring various elements of violence prevention. The workshops are designed to examine such approaches from multiple perspectives and at multiple levels of society. In particular, the workshop on the contagion of violence focused on exploring the epidemiology of the contagion, describing possible processes and mechanisms by which violence is transmitted, examining how contextual factors mitigate or exacerbate the issue. Contagion of Violence: Workshop Summary covers the major topics that arose during the 2-day workshop. It is organized by important elements of the infectious disease model so as to present the contagion of violence in a larger context and in a more compelling and comprehensive way.

This volume is an overview of research examining the relationship between hormones and aggressive behavior. The last 15 years have witnessed a tremen dous growth of knowledge in this area, yet reviews written by specialists are virtually nonexistent. This work is an attempt to provide a comprehensive and cohesive synthesis of this literature. Chapters 1-7 provide an analysis of hor monal influences on the major forms of aggressive behavior, including intermale, interfemale, shock-induced, maternal, territorial, and predatory aggression. The focus of Chapters 8-12 is an examination of the mechanisms through which hormones might act to produce changes in agonistic responding. Genetic, de velopmental, neural, and biochemical influences are considered. It is well known that environment, social context, and experience modulate the effects of hor mones on behavior. Thus, Chapters 13-15 are designed to review the literature concerning hormone-pheromone interactions, hormonal responses to compe tition, and the influence of social context on the endocrine system and aggressive behavior. Frequently, the principles advanced by behavioral endocrinologists are based on research in one species, the rodent. To provide a more comparative perspective and to examine specifically the generality of those principles gen erated for rodents, Chapters 16-22 examine hormone-aggression relationships in a variety of species, including fish, birds, amphibians, reptiles, infrahuman primates, humans, ungulates, and insects. This volume should be useful to both beginning and advanced researchers in animal behavior, behavioral endocri nology, physiological psychology, neuroendocrinology, zoology, physiology, and psychiatry.