Correlation Between Power And Aggression

Aggression is defined as hostile or violent behavior towards one another. Aggressive individuals are thought to be low in self-esteem. The purpose of this study is to determine the relationship between aggression, fear of negative evaluation, and total power. Individuals with little to no power who perceive themselves to incompetent are less aggressive than those with higher power. However, individuals who perceive themselves to be competent but with little to no power are less aggressive than those with little to no power but perceive themselves to incompetent.

Methods

Participants This study consisted of 107 (82 women, 25 men) students from Research Methods courses at Kennesaw State University. The ages ranged from 19 to 54 years, Mage

The items on the questionnaire included demographics (age, date of birth, ethnicity, and gender), total power (power and authority), aggression, and fear of negative evaluation (FNE). Measures on the questionnaire were the Brief Fear of Negative Evaluation Scale (FNE) (Leary, 1983) and the Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire-Short Form (BAPQ-SF) (Diamond & Magaletta, 2006). The FNE (Leary, 1983) is a 1(not at all characteristic of me)-5(extremely characteristic of me) point Likert scale. The BAPQ-SF is a 1(very unlike me) to 7(very like me) Likert scale measuring aggression. Students were instructed to answer the questions with the appropriate number on the scale characteristic to them. The completed surveys were then collected by the

While individuals with higher power but lower FNE scores, low power but high FNE scores, and low power low FNE scores were less aggressive. It is not known what aspects are attributed to individuals who tend to be more aggressive than others. However, higher aggression and high fear of negative evaluation can be the result of low self-esteem (Baumeister, Boden, & Smart, 1996). Higher powered individuals tend to be more aggressive due to misinterpretation of the perception others (Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003). Individuals who are higher in power tend to be in higher demand and receive a lot of attention, which can cause them to possess a large ego (Fiske, 1993). The absence of attention and demand to an individual with high power can be a threat to their self-esteem causing them to react in an aggressive way (Baumeister, Boden, & Smart, 1996). The belief is that people with low self-esteem behave in a violent and aggressive manner in an attempt to boost their self-esteem (Baumeister, Boden, & Smart,