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Discuss Theories of the Maintenance of Relationships (8 and 16 marks)

One Theory into the maintenance of relationships is Walster et al’s Equity theory. This says that people want equity in a relationship and inequity has a big potential to cause dissatisfaction. People who either give a lot and receive a little or give a little and receive a lot in a relationship would see inequity and therefore become dissatisfied.

A supporting study was conducted into the Equity Theory by Stafford and Canary (2006) who asked over 200 couples to complete measures of equity and marital satisfaction. It was found that satisfaction was highest in those who saw their relationships to be equitable and lowest in those who saw it as inequitable. This would support Equity as a theory for the maintenance of relationships as it shows that if people feel equal in the relationship they are more likely to happy in the relationship and therefore want to maintain it.

DeMaris (2007) also carried out a study which supported the equity theory as a theory for the maintenance of relationships by having 1500 couples take the ‘US National Survey of Families and Households’ and found that inequity was a high cause of marital dispute and raised the risk of divorce, especially when the women felt under benefited. This supports the equity theory as it shows that people who do not feel their relationship is equitable are more likely to have marital disputes and think of divorce which goes against maintaining the relationship meaning that if they had equity their relationships would be maintained better.

The Equity theory however could suffer from Gender bias as it has been suggested by research that women and men see equity in a relationship differently and that women often seek less for themselves in a relationship. This therefore reduces the Validity of the theory.

Another Theory of the maintenance of relationships is the Investment Theory. This theory looks more at how much commitment to a relationship is down to investment rather than satisfaction and says that if we have a greater investment in a relationship we are more likely to have a bigger commitment to it. These investments can be financial, temporal or emotional.

Dindia and Baxtor (1987) conducted a study which supported the investment theory by looking into how 50 couples maintained their relationships and found that the longer a couple was together the higher satisfaction was with less maintenance strategies being used. This suggests that temporal investment is linked to the commitment to the relationship which would support the investment theory as a theory of the maintenance of relationship as, as the investment got bigger so did the commitment to maintaining the relationship.    

The investment theory can also be used to explain the maintenance of abusive relationships and why individuals stay in an abusive relationship. Rusbult and Martz (1995) conducted a study to look into this by interviewing women form a shelter for women coming out of abusive relationships.  They found that when abused women felt their investment in a relationship was significant, they were less likely to leave their partners. This would support the investment theory as a theory of the maintenance of relationships as it shows that people are more likely to stay in a relationship and are therefore more committed to it, even an abusive one, the bigger their investment is.

However this study was carried out using interviews which is a self-report method meaning that participants could have given answers which they thought to be socially desirable rather than truthful answers, this needs to be taken into account when drawing conclusions are drawn from the results of this study as they could be inaccurate.

The Investment theory can be said to be culturally bias and cannot be generalised across the world as in some cultures it is things such as religious pressure or breakups being socially unaccepted that cause the maintenance of a relationships rather than how much investment or commitment a person has to it.

Discuss Theories for the Breakdown of Relationships (8 and 16 marks)

One Theory for the breakdown of relationships is Walster et al’s Equity theory. This says that people want equity in a relationship and inequity has a big potential to cause dissatisfaction. People who either give a lot and receive a little or give a little and receive a lot in a relationship would see inequity and therefore become dissatisfied leading the relationship to breakdown.

A supporting study was conducted into the Equity Theory by Stafford and Canary (2006) who asked over 200 couples to complete measures of equity and marital satisfaction. It was found that satisfaction was highest in those who saw their relationships to be equitable and lowest in those who saw it as inequitable. This would support Equity as a theory for the breakdown of relationships as it shows that if people don’t feel equal in a relationship they are more likely to become dissatisfied and therefore not want to maintain the relationship causing it to breakdown.

DeMaris (2007) also carried out a study which supported the equity theory as a theory for the breakdown of relationships by having 1500 couples take the ‘US National Survey of Families and Households’ and found that inequity was a high cause of marital dispute and raised the risk of divorce, especially when the women felt under benefited. This supports the equity theory as it shows that people who do not feel their relationship is equitable are more likely to have marital disputes and think of divorce causing the relationship to breakdown.

The Equity theory however could suffer from Gender bias as it has been suggested by research that women and men see equity in a relationship differently and that women often seek less for themselves in a relationship. This therefore reduces the Validity of the theory.

The validity can also be reduced by the fact that the Equity theory is also seen to be culturally bias as research would suggest that in other cultures, such as Jamaica, equity is not an important factor in a relationship. This theory can therefore not be generalised to all cultures.

Another theory for the breakdown of relationships is the Investment Theory. This theory looks more at how much commitment to a relationship is down to investment rather than satisfaction and says that if we have a smaller investment in a relationship we are more likely to have a smaller commitment to it therefore leading to its breakdown. These investments can be financial, temporal or emotional.

Dindia and Baxtor (1987) conducted a study which supported the investment theory by looking into how 50 couples maintained their relationships and found that the longer a couple was together the higher satisfaction was with less maintenance strategies being used. This suggests that temporal investment is linked to the commitment to the relationship which would support the investment theory as a theory of the breakdown of relationship as, as the investment got bigger so did the commitment to maintaining the relationship therefore showing that if the commitment is low there is less want to maintain the relationship meaning it is more likely to breakdown. 

The Investment theory can be said to be culturally bias and cannot be generalised across the world as in some cultures it is things such as religious pressure or breakups being socially unaccepted that determine whether or not a relationship breaks up rather than how much investment or commitment a person has to it.

Discuss Theories about the Formation of Relationships (8 and 16 marks)

One theory of the formation of relationships is Byrne and Clore’s Reward/Need Satisfaction theory which says that we look for a relationship with someone who meets our needs and whom we can get the biggest reward from. We are also said to like people who we associate with pleasant events and who we met when happy as we are much more inclined to like someone we meet when happy rather than when sad.

Griffit and Guay (1996) conducted a study to support the reward/need satisfaction theory by having an experimenter evaluate participants carrying out a task and then asking them to rate how much they liked the experimenter. They found the rating was highest when the experimenter had evaluated the participant positively on their performance. This would support the reward need satisfaction theory as the participants liked the experimenter more when they were feeling good and associated them with a pleasant experience.

Cate et al (1982) carried out a study to look into how important rewards are in a relationship, and therefore whether the reward/need satisfaction theory is right in saying we look for someone who can give us reward, by asking 337 individuals to assess their current relationships in terms of reward level and satisfaction. Results showed that reward level was superior to all other factors in relationship satisfaction. This supports the reward/need satisfaction theory as a theory for the formation of relationships as it shows that we value rewards in a relationship and therefore will seek someone who can give us this when forming a relationship.

Cate’s study however is lacking in internal validity as it was carried out using a self-report method. This means that participants could have given answers which they thought were socially desirable rather than totally truthful ones and this should be taken into account when using these results to draw conclusions about theories of the formation of relationships and should be looked at alongside other studies to make wrong conclusions are not drawn.

Most studies carried out into the reward/need satisfaction theory are lab studies and therefore cannot show that the principles of need, reward and satisfaction apply to relationships in real life. This would cause the studies to lack mundane realism and means that these studies along with studies carried out not in a lab should be looked at together when conclusions are drawn about the formation of relationships.

The reward/need satisfaction theory also has some problems with cultural bias as it does not account for differences in relationships in different cultures which will change the way in which relationships are formed. This means it cannot therefore be fully generalised to the whole population meaning it is lacking in population validity. 

Another theory of formation of relationships is Byrne, Clore and Smeaton’s Similarity theory. This says that we are attracted to people similar to ourselves in personality and attitude. This is said to stop as many arguments and disagreements occurring as you and your partner are more likely to have the same views and this is said to make for a longer healthier relationship.

Newcomb (1961) conducted a study which supported the Similarity theory by randomly allocating 17 male students into shared rooms while they studied at Michigan University. He found that by the end of the year 58% of those who had been paired with someone who was similar to themselves had formed friendships with their room-mate compared to only 25% of those with different attitudes and personalities. This would support the Similarity theory of formation of relationships as It showed those who were similar were willing and more likely to form relationship that those with different personalities and attitudes who didn’t get on so well.

It has been suggested that both the reward/need satisfaction theory and the similarity theory have evolved from our ancestors drive to focus their efforts on the right relationships and this suggests an evolutionary basis to both of these theories.  Because of this it can be argued that they are speculative and based on little or no evidence. Hayes argued that evolutionary psychology has a tendency to ignore ‘null findings’ and facts that do not fit the theory that is being proposed. However it can be argued that all science does this to some extent not just evolutionary psychology.  

Discuss the Relationship between Sexual Selection and Human Reproductive Behaviour (8 & 12 marks)

Reproductive success is a big part of evolution as without it genes would not be passed on. Darwin (1874) came up with the theory of Sexual Selection to explain how one sex attracts the other which contained two processes; Intrasexual Selection (mate competition) where one sex competes with each other to gain access to the other sex and Intersexual Selection (mate choice) where one sex looks for members of the other sex that possess certain wanted qualities.

The female menstrual cycle is said to be a factor of Sexual Selection. It is suggested that women nearest to the most fertile part of their cycle are the most attractive to men. Miller et al (2007) did a study to support this in the US by looking at the amount of tips lap dancers received at various stages of their menstrual cycle. He found that the girls in the most fertile part of their cycle earned almost twice the amount of tips as the others. This would support the menstrual cycle as a factor of Sexual Selection as it showed that the most fertile females were the most attractive to the males.

Humans have a variety of different mating strategies, some of which have evolve for short term mating success. These tend to be more apparent in men as they aim to pass on as many genes as possible through short term mating and casual whereas females can only have one child at a time and so are more likely to look for long term mating. 

A study to support that evolved short term mating strategies are more apparent in men was carried out by Clarke and Hatfield (1989) when both male and female experimenters approached total strangers and asked them a number of questions. It was found that of the females approached 50% agreed to go on a date with the stranger, 6% agreed to go back to his apartment and 0% agreed to have sex with him whereas of the men approach 50% agreed to go on a date, 69% to go back to the apartment and 75% to have sex with her. This supports that men are more interested in passing on their genes quickly through short term mating as they were far more interested in mating with the girl straight away and not interested on going on a date whereas the girls were totally not interested in mating straight away but were interested in dating suggesting that they had more long term mating strategies in mind.

Research consistently shows that men more than women have a desire for short term mating, however this is a very gender bias view. Although short term mating carries some considerable potential costs to a woman there are also possible benefits of it, such as more genetically diverse offspring and a way of getting out of a poor quality relationship, which also need to be taken into account when looking into short term mating.

In long term mating both sexes invest very highly in any offspring. As a poor quality long term mate could be disastrous for both sexes there is very high level of sexual selection in both when choosing a long term partner.

This was shown by Buss (1989) in a supporting study where he looked at what both males and females want from a partner in over 10,000 people in 37 different cultures. The main results showed that women desired men with resources whereas most men put more importance on physical appearance and age (wanting younger women) suggesting that they are looking for fertility. Both sexes were shown to want both intelligence and dependableness which are both linked to long term mating. This shows that sexual selection is very important to both sexes but it also differs a lot between the two and also shows that choosing a good long term partner through sexual selection is an important part of the human reproductive behaviour.

Buss’s study is very valid both generally and culturally as it was carried out on a very large sample across many cultures meaning it was more likely to be a representative sample allowing his results to be generalized to others. 

Discuss the Influence of Childhood on Adult Relationships (8 and 16 marks)

Parent-Child Relationships are one way in which childhood can affect your adult relationships. Shaver et al (1988) said that our romantic love in adult relationships is effected by three things from our childhood; attachment, caregiving and sexuality. Relationships in adulthood are said to be a continuum of early attachment styles because this promotes your internal working model of relationships. Caregiving is also learned by modelling the behaviour of your primary caregiver, along with sexuality.

Simpson et al (2007) carried out a longitudinal study across 25 years to support the effects of Parent-child relationships on Adult relationships. He studies 78 participants at 4 key points across the 25 years; infancy, where at one year caregivers reported on their attachment behaviour, early childhood, where at 6-8 years teachers were asked about interactions of the child with peers, adolescence, where at 16 participants were asked to describe any friendships or relationships, and adulthood, where participants romantic relationships were described. He found that the expressions of emotion in adult relationships can be lined back to a person’s early attachment experiences and that those who were securely attached as infants were more socially confident at 6-8 years, closer to their friends at 16 and more expressive and emotionally attached in relationships in adulthood. This supports the fact that Parent-Child relationships have an effect on adult relationships as it shows that the relationship in the form of the attachment type between a parent and child does in fact affect how attached and emotional we are in adult relationships.    

An undermining study of the effects that parent-child relationships have on adult relationships was carried out by Suomi and Harlow (1978) who looked at rhesus monkeys and the effect early attachment had on them and found that those moneys whom when young had had completely adequate parent-child relationships but bad peer relationships where the ones who displayed inappropriate social and sexual behaviour as adults. The longer they were left without contact with other young monkeys the worse this got. This would undermine the effects of parent-child relationships on adult relationships as this showed that adult relationships are more likely to be effected by bad peer relationships than parent-child relationships.

However this study was carried out on animals and therefore the results are not as undermining of parent-child relationships effect on adult relationships as those of a study carried out on humans would be and the results cannot be fully generalised to humans which causes the study to lack external validity. Although experiment into this topic cannot be carried out on human children as it carries big ethical issues and therefore conducting studies on animals is the only way we can gain an insight into certain topic areas.

Another way in which childhood can affect adult relationships is through childhood abuse. This can have a number of negative effects on adult’s psychological functions, especially in their trust of other people. This therefore makes it difficult for those adults to form and maintain a healthy relationship.

Berenson and Anderson (2006) provided support for the idea that abused children have difficulties in adult relationships by finding that adult women in particular who had been abused in childhood displayed negative reactions to those who reminded them of their abusive parent and that they tend to use inappropriate behaviour learnt from this parent in their own relationships causing their relationships to often be negative ones. This supports the fact that childhood influences adult relationships as it shows that behaviour learnt in childhood is carried on into adult relationships and when this is bad or abusive it can ruin and adult relationships.

The influence of childhood on adult relationships can be seen to be deterministic as it says that our childhood has a fixed effect on our adult relationship, however this is not the case as we have free will to choose how we act in later relationships and whether or not to let these experiences lead us. Also social learning theory would say that we learn though observing other which in this case could be seeing relationships completely different to those we have experienced before and copying those instead of building on our own bad experiences.   

Discuss Sex differences in Parental Investment (8 and 16 marks)

Parental Investment is said to be any investment by a parent in an offspring that increases the chance that the offspring will survive at the expense of that parent’s ability to invest in any other offspring.

One Sex difference in parental investment is that men are more concerned about cuckoldry than women. This is due to the fact that women know 100% that the offspring is theirs however a man does not know this and is therefore worried as they do not want to invest their resources in any offspring that is not their own.

Daley and Wilson (1982) conducted a study to support the fact that men are more concerned by cuckoldry than women by making recordings of spontaneous conversations in a maternity ward. They found that relatives are much more likely to comment on the baby’s resemblance to the father than any other family member. It was also recorded in one conversation a man commenting that is the baby looked like his partners ex-boyfriend, who was of a different race, he would not invest in it. This supports the fact that men are more concerned about cuckoldry than women as people comment on the baby’s resemblance to the father to reassure him that the baby is his and also they are shown to be more concerned about making sure that the baby is very like them.

This study however was a naturalistic observation and therefore there were many uncontrolled extraneous variables present which could have affected the results. Also the sample of participants is very unlikely to be representative of the whole population and therefore cannot be fully generalised across the population.

However Anderson (1999) conducted a study which would undermine the fact that men are more concerned by cuckoldry than women by looking at the investment of stepfathers in children that were not their own. He found that there was no discrimination between children that were their own and the children that were not. This would undermine the fact that men are more concerned about cuckoldry as it would suggest men are not as bothered as it has been suggested about investing resources in to genes that are not their own.   

Sex differences in  Parental investment can be seen to be reductionist as it is based just on evolutionary factors alone which is a very limited view of parental investment and has ignored things such as the media and our own upbringing that can also have an effect on how we invest in offspring in the present day. This therefore is a far too specific view and a better-rounded one should be looked at before any conclusions are drawn.

Another Sex Difference in Parental investment is that females are better prepared both physically and mentally for parenting. Geher suggested that this was the product of evolution and looked into this by asking none parent undergraduates to complete a scale of how ready they perceived themselves to be for parenthood. Although the scale found no difference in perceived readiness for parenting between males and females, when scenarios were given emphasising the psychological costs of parenting males showed significantly higher levels of autonomic nervous system arousal. Although this does not seem to support the fact that females are better prepared for parenting as  both showed the same on the scale, it could actually support this as a self-report method was used to gather results which means that participants could have given socially desirable answers rather than truthful ones on how they actually felt and the fact that males showed a so much higher level of arousal on the second part of the study suggests that they may have lied about how ready they were for parenting on the first scale. This use of self-report also causes the study to lack internal validity.

A criticism of Sex differences in Parental investment is that it stresses evolutionary factors which determine parental investment. This means that it is very on the side of nature in the nature/nurture debate. This is an issue as it does not recognise the value of approaches such as the social learning theory which would explain the influence of nurture in parental investment. Therefore Sex differences in parental investment can be criticized as being too simplistic an explanation and it could be argued that both nature and nurture are important in explaining parental investment.  

Discuss Research into the Nature of Relationships in Different Cultures (8 & 16 marks)

Different cultures have different ideas on relationships and how they are viewed and acted out. For example love and romance are seen to be very important in the western cultures and marriages are based on this, however in non-western cultures, such as china, love and romance are less important. To Western cultures ‘falling in love’ is seen to be a vital part of growing up and Erikson (1968) believed that the establishment of an intimate relationship is an essential part of young adulthood which if unsuccessful can lead to social isolation.

A study which supported the fact that different cultures have their own ideas on relationships was carried out by Moore and Leung (2001) who compared 212 students, born and studying in Australia, with 106 students born in China but studying in Australia. They found that 61% of the Australian students were in relationships compared to only 38% of Chinese students. They also found that Australian males were more casual about relationships than Australian females whereas both Chinese males and females shoed similar levels of romance. This shows that there is a difference in the nature of relationships in different cultures as the Australian students and the Chinese students showed different results and different ideas on relationships. 

This study however is lacking in population validity and can therefore not be generalised to everybody in other cultures. This is because it was carried out on a sample of all similar aged people of only two different cultures who were all living in Australia which is not a representative sample of the whole population causing the study to have low external validity.

A supporting study into the idea that love is a basis for marriage was carried out by Levine et al (1995) who looked for evidence of this in 11 countries. When participants where asked if they would marry someone they did not know 86% of Americans said they would refuse compared to only 34% in Thailand and 24% in India. This suggests that western cultures are a lot more focused on the idea of love as a basis for marriage than other cultures who appear to be a lot more prepared to marry someone they do not love, again suggesting different ideas on relationships between cultures.

As Levine’s study was carried out across many cultures it has more cultural validity than the one conducted by Moore and Leung however we all tend to assume that what is done in our own culture is normal and therefore you can get cultural bias from the researcher.

The idea that the nature of relationships differs between cultures due to the differences in ideas about love can be seen to be to narrow as it leaves out other important ideas about relationships in different cultures such as wanting protection and resources from a mate rather than love. This is a weakness as it means that only a very small section of the factors that do effect relationships are looked at meaning from this research we can never get a good well rounded idea of why relationships differ in different cultures. For this to happen, other factors would have to be looked into and combined with this research.

One idea that is ignored in the differences in relationships between cultures due to love is voluntary and involuntary relationships. In western cultures we get choice of who we want to marry however in some cultures arranged marriages are the norm. This seems to work well for them due to low divorce rates and the fact that most people report that they have eventually fallen in love with their arranged partner. This was looked into by Gupta and Singh (982) in a supporting longitudinal study of 100 couples living in India, 50 form arranged marriages and 50 form love marriages. They were asked how much they ‘liked’ and ‘loved’ their partners after 1, 5 and 10 years of marriage. They found that in love marriages both liking and loving were very high to start off with however decreased over time. In arranged marriages however they were found to ‘like’ and ‘love’ each other more after 10 years than those form love marriages. This supports the differences in relationships in different cultures as it shows that different types of marriages work in different cultures.

Gupta and Singh’s study can however be criticised as, even though a longitudinal study can be useful for collecting results over a long period of time, it cannot show causation and therefore effects the internal reliability of the study.   

Outline and Explain Psychological Explanations of and Eating Disorder (8 & 16 marks)

One psychological theory of Bulimia is the Cognitive approach. Cooper et al. (2004) said that Bulimics usually had a trauma in early life that leads them to feel unloved, worthless and not accepted. As these people get older the get exposed to diets, ‘perfect’ body shapes and criticisms of their own body. This leads to them thinking ‘fat = bad’ and therefore start to diet to get accepted. This then sets of a vicious cycle where they feel worthless and think binging would help which then makes them feel fat and unaccepted leading them to purge and feel worthless again.

A study was conducted to support the cognitive approach by Leung et al (2000) who found that a lack of parental bonding was linked to dysfunctional beliefs which have been linked to binging and purging. Wellar (2000) also found this and that stress and loneliness can trigger binging. This supports the cognitive model as it shows that the binging and purging linked to bulimia are triggered by a thought process.

The cognitive model is undermined by the fact that it should be treatable through Cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT) but Fairburn et al (1995)found that this wasn’t always the case after trying to treat Bulimics using CBT and finding that only 50% were symptom free and 37% still fit bulimia criteria. This undermines the cognitive model as an explanation for bulimia as it shows that bulimia is not always treatable as a cognitive process.

Cognitive explanations can be seen to be a reductionist approach to bulimia. This means that some other factors that may contribute to Bulimia have been forgotten about so that the cognitive approach can be focused on alone. It is likely that other factors such as biological or evolutionary explanations play a part in Bulimia as well and therefore it is probably more useful to have a more well-rounded approach rather than a specific one. However saying it is reductionist could be unfair as all scientific research has to be quite specific to establish a cause and effect relationship.

Another psychological explanation of Bulimia is the Relationship Process. This says that bulimia occurs because women try to change themselves in order to meet a perceived idea of when men find ‘attractive’. These people tend to be dissatisfied with their own physical appearance, self-conscious about their body and worry they will not be accepted by their partners and often about being self-conscious during sexual activity.

Schembri and Evans (2008) conducted a study to support the relationship process as an explanation for bulimia by having 225 women form intimate relationships answer questionnaires on eating behaviours, themselves and their relationships. Around 8% of these women were receiving professional help for eating disorders. They found that the strongest predictor of bulimic symptoms was self-consciousness during sexual activity. This would support the relationship process as an explanation for bulimia as these women were showing bulimic symptoms most likely to try and change themselves to be ‘accepted’ by both themselves and their partners to reduce this self-consciousness.

This study however was carried out using a self-report method and therefore answers that the women thought were socially desirable could have been given instead of truthful ones. This reduced the internal validity of Shembri and Evans’s study. It is also very gender biased as it was carried out solely on women and the results can therefore not be generalised to men reducing the study’s population validity.

Studies into Bulimia appear to have a heterosexual bias as well as a gender bias as most of the research into bulimia is carried out only on heterosexual women excluding any other groups who may also be vulnerable to bulimia. This has occurred even though a study by Feldman and Meyer showed that gay and bisexual men have the highest rates of suffering from an eating disorder with heterosexual women having a much lower percentage. This could be due to the fact that high expectations of physical appearance are often apparent in the gay community.       

Outline and Evaluate the Role of Neural Mechanisms in Controlling Eating (8 & 16 marks)

Homeostasis is the way in which the brain controls the body’s eating behaviour and keeps levels in our body constant and stable. One theory is that it does this through the dual hypothalamic process which says we have an on switch, Lateral Hypothalamus (LH), and an off switch, ventromedial hypothalamus (VMH), which controls our eating.

The Lateral hypothalamus or ‘feeding centre’ is stimulated to make us feel hungry when our body produces high levels of ghrelin or low levels of either glucose or leptin. If the lateral hypothalamus is damaged then people get aphagia where they do not get hungry and therefore don’t eat. A neurotransmitter called Neuropeptide Y (NPY) is also very important in turning eating on and is found in the hypothalamus. The Ventromedial hypothalamus or ‘satiety centre’ is stimulated to make us feel full when our body produces high levels of glucose or leptin and produces CCK. If this is damaged people get hyperphagia which causes them to not feel full and therefore overeat.

Stellar conducted a study to support the dual hypothalamic process where he stimulated both the LH and the WHM separately in the brains of rats and measuring the amounts of glucose, leptin, ghrelin and CCK in them. He observed that in the rats the LH did in fact turn on hunger and start eating and the VHM make them feel full and stop them eating. This would support neural mechanisms having a role in controlling eating behaviour as the rats eating behaviour changed due to these mechanisms and seemingly nothing else.

Stellar’s study however is lacking in external validity because it was carried out on rats and not humans. It cannot be fully generalised to humans as we have a very different psychological makeup and therefore it cannot be shown that our brain works in the same way as theirs. This is a big weakness in animal studies and reduces how supporting the evidence actually is. However there is a benefit to animal studies as we are allowed to do research on them in ways we would not be allowed to research on humans so they do give us good ideas into topics that we would otherwise have no idea about.

Studying the dual hypothalamic process to show the role of neural mechanisms in controlling eating can be seen to be reductionist as it assumes that the only things influencing eating are the VMH and LH whereas there could be many factors in the body also contributing to it. It would be a better idea to get a more well-rounded view to understand what actually controls eating more fully. However all scientific research does have to be quite specific to establish a cause and effect relationship and therefore saying it is reductionist may be a bit too critical.

Another part of the brain which has been associated with controlling eating is the amygdala which links emotions with food you have previously eaten. Garg et al (2007) did a study to support the fact that emotions and eating are linked by showing 38 participants either a sad movie or a happy movie and observing their eating habits throughout. All participants were given the same amount of popcorn at the start of the movie and how much each person had eaten was measured at the end. It was found that those watching the sad movie ate on average 38% more popcorn than those watching a happy movie. This supports the fact that eating and emotion are linked as the emotion of the participants affected their eating behaviour during the study.

However Garg’s study has many problems with extraneous variables as it is impossible to know the eating habits or emotions of the participants usually and therefore there could have been something other than their emotions effecting what and how they were eating.

Rolls and Rolls (1973) carried out a study to support the role of the amygdala in eating behaviour by surgically removing the amygdala in some rats and leaving it in others then proceeding to give them both familiar and unfamiliar food. They found that the rats with no amygdala would happily consume both sets of food whereas the amygdala-intact rats would consume only the familiar foods. This would support the fact that the amygdala links past experiences to previously eaten foods as those with no amygdala would happily eat any food as they had no past experiences linked to any foods whereas those with an amygdala would only eat the foods they knew and therefore had a past experience with. This study, like Stellar’s, lacks external validity as it was carried out on rats and not humans.   

Outline and Evaluate Biological Explanations of an eating disorder (8 & 16 marks)

One biological explanation of Bulimia is Evolutionary explanations. Abed (998) said that bulimia is a direct consequence of trying to attract a mate. Weight loss comes from trying to get a good body shape and high hips-to-waist ratio to attract a mate. This comes from men evolving to avoid even the slightest thickening of the waist in order not to have another man’s child. Our drive to be thin has adapted from a need for younger women to differentiate themselves from older women, but as in today’s western societies older women fit the desired body shape there is pressure on younger women to go ‘one better’ which leads to eating disorders.

Soundy et al (1995) conducted a study to support this by studying bulimia in females in the US for 10 years. He found that bulimia was 33 times more likely in females than males. This supports evolutionary explanations as the females are trying to be thin to attract males but males who do not need to attract other males do not feel the need to try so hard to be thin.

It can be argued that evolutionary explanations are based on little or no evidence and that they tend to ignore any facts that do not fit the proposed theory. In this case bulimia does not take into account that thin is not seen as attractive in all cultures. The Social learning theory which says that we learn through observation could explain this as in our culture we see other people, especially in the media, trying to be very thin and so observe and copy this behaviour whereas in other cultures they do not see this and therefore the Social Learning theory would say that is why eating disorders are not as apparent as they are in western cultures. This would argue against evolutionary explanations as it is a more behavioural based explanation of bulimia.

Another criticism of this evolutionary psychology is that it is deterministic and says our genes are the reason for the way we behave and fails to take into account individual differences and free will along with anything else that could explain why someone has bulimia such as the media.

Another biological explanation of Bulimia is neural explanations. One of the neurotransmitters involved in this is serotonin. An imbalance in serotonin has been linked to bulimia as it has a big role in controlling anxiety levels as well as perception of hunger and appetite. Low levels of serotonin result in depression while high levels result in anxiety. Binge eating may raise serotonin levels to decrease depression but can then cause anxiety causing purging in bulimics.

Smith et al (1999) carried out a study into serotonin as a factor for bulimia by comparing giving some participants with bulimia snacks and drinks containing an amino acid that occurs naturally in food and is used by the body to produce serotonin and some snacks and drinks without this. He found that after being starved of this amino acid for 17 hours greater dips in mood and concern for body image were shown. This supports serotonin as a factor for Bulimia as it shows that lowering the levels of serotonin in the brain does in fact trigger characteristics of bulimia.

If Bulimia is actually a product of abnormal serotonin levels it should therefore be treatable by drugs that target serotonin levels specifically. Walsh et al (2000) conducted a supporting study into this by giving 22 patients with Bulimia either a course of fluoxetine (a drug which targets serotonin levels) or a placebo. He found significant improvements in the patients who had been given fluoxetine, especially in terms of decreased binging and purging. This supports neural explanations of bulimia as if it can be treated by a drug targeted at neurotransmitters then it must be down to this that it occurs in the first place.

There is an age bias in a lot of research into bulimia as it mostly focuses on adolescent girls and young women. However Mangweth-Matzek (2006) found that 4% of her 475 people sample of 60-70 year old women also fit the diagnosis criteria for bulimia. This shows that bulimia should not just be looked into for younger women but also older women when they show weight loss and vomiting symptoms. 

Discuss Explanations for the Success and Failure of Dieting (8 & 16 marks)

People Diet in order to get rid of body dissatisfaction and to change their body shape, but often fail for a number of different reasons.

One Reason why diets fail is Denial. When people know they are not allowed to eat something they try to supress al thoughts of it, however the more they try not to think about it, the more they do think about it therefore wanting to eat more than they usually do. Wegner (1994) called it the ‘Theory of Ironic Processes of Mental Control’ and says that it can change a person’s cognitive state which can cause them to over react towards ‘forbidden foods’.

Wegner et al (1987) carried out a study to support the fact the supressing thoughts makes you think about them more where he told one group of participants to think a white bear and one group not to. They then had to ring a bell every time they thought about the white bear. He found that those who were not allowed to think of the white bear thought about it a lot more than those who were allowed to think of it which is exactly what the theory suggested.  This would show how diets fail because when people are stuck to a strict diet they will try not to think about other food but by doing so think about it more and therefore eat more and fail the diet.

Keys et al (1950) also conducted a study to support the ‘Theory of Ironic Processes of Mental Control’   where he studied 36 conscientious objectors to the Korean War, none of which were dieters. He gave them half of their usual food intake for 12 weeks and found that although on average they lost 25% of their starting body weight, they became obsessed with food and when allowed to eat normally again many of the participants became binge eaters. This supports the theory as it shows that after not being allowed to eat what food they wanted their cognitive state and attitude towards food changed and they became obsessed with it. It also shows why diets would fail due to the Theory of Ironic Processes of Mental Control because when people are on diets they are restricted in what they can and cannot eat and therefore may become obsessed with the food they are not allowed to eat making it even harder to resist often resulting in the eating of it and the failure of the diet.

However Keys study only used 36 people and only Koreans which is not a representative sample of the population therefore meaning it cannot be generalized to everyone. This makes the study lack cultural and population validity. Also this study was done over 60 years ago and is therefore very out of date meaning it is likely to lack temporal validity as todays attitudes to food and lifestyles are very different.

Redden (2008) suggested that one way to make a diet succeed would be to pay more attention to what we are actually eating. His theory says that people are likely to enjoy and experience less every time they experience it and therefore people tend to give up on diets as it becomes repetitive and boring. He suggested that if we actually focus in detail on what we are eating rather than the fact it is just another salad you can make it different each time and therefore more enjoyable making it easier to stick to.

Redden supported his own theory by giving 135 people 22 jelly beans each, one at a time. One group was shown general information about the jelly bean (eg. Bean 7 etc.) and the other group saw more detailed flavour information (eg. Cherry flavoured bean 7 etc.). It was found that the participants who saw the general information got bored of eating the jelly beans much more quickly than those who saw the detailed flavoured information who found the task a lot more enjoyable. This supports the idea of detail as the people who saw the food as ‘just another jelly bean’ got bored a lot more easily. This would show why diets fail as often people think about the food they are allowed to eat as ‘just another…’ which makes them bored of it quicker and therefore want to eat other food more.

Redden’s study has good reliability as it was done in lab setting and in a controlled environment therefore lowering the extraneous variables and making it easily replicable by others meaning that Redden himself or others can back up his findings.

Both Denial and Detail as explanations for the success and failure of dieting can be said to be reductionist as they are both very simple reasons on why a diet would succeed or fail and both fail to take into account other factors such as biological explanations. However the other factors have been forgotten about so that the success and failure of dieting can be looked at specifically and this is often needed when researching all science. Because of this these theories should not be looked at too much in isolation but in addition to other theories or as part of a more well-rounded approach such as one including social learning theory which says that people learn their behaviour through the observation of others and would disagree that diets fail due to our own thought processes but due to what we have learnt from others. 

Discuss Evolutionary Explanations of Food Preferences (8 & 16 marks)

Our Eating Habits and food preferences are said to have come from our ancestors and to have adapted in our Environment of Evolutionary Adaptation (EEA). Our Ancestors were hunter gatherers, whose diets consisted of animals and plants, and energy resources were vital to them to stay alive.

In our EEA our ancestors were required to eat meat to compensate for the bad quality plant food and to give them the essential amino acids, nutrients and minerals they needed for brain growth so that they could eat the plant food purely for the calories. This is said to be the reason we now have a preference for meat however it does not give an explanation for vegetarians.

We are also said to have developed a taste aversion to avoid foods that would make us ill. If a food makes us ill when we eat it we develop an aversion to it so that we can avoid it in the future.

Garcia et al. (1955) conducted a study to support the fact that we have developed a taste aversion by feeding poisoned lamb meat to wolves to make them ill. He found that after this experience with the lamb meat the wolves avoided eating it in the future which would suggest that they had developed an aversion to it. This supports taste aversion as an evolutionary explanation of food preferences as it is likely that just like the wolves we used this to avoid foods that were harmful to us to survive.

Garcia’s study however is lacking in external validity because it was carried out on wolves and not humans. It cannot be fully generalized to humans as we have a very different psychological makeup and therefore it cannot be said that our brains work in the same way as theirs. This is a big weakness in animal studies and means that this study is not as supporting of taste aversion as others that are conducted on humans.           

Morning Sickness in pregnant women also supports taste aversion. Morning Sickness is found in 75% of pregnant women and Profet suggested that the reason they vomit is because their body is trying to get rid of anything in the body that may harm, the embryo. He called this the ‘Embryo Protection Hypothesis.’ It is also the reason why some women develop an aversion to certain foods during pregnancy. This supports taste aversion as an evolutionary process and an adaptation form our ancestors as in our EEA this would be they only way mother had of knowing which foods could be harmful to their child and it shows that our bodies have adapted to use this to give our offspring the best chance of survival.

Sandell and Breslin (2006) also carried out a study to support taste aversion where they screened 35 adults for the bitter taste receptor gene. They were then asked to rate the bitterness of a number of vegetables, some of which contained glucosinolates and some which didn’t. Glucosinolates are known for having a toxic effect in high doses. They found those which a sensitive form of the generated the glucosinolate containing vegetables 60% more bitter than those with an insensitive form of the gene. The ability to detect and avoid naturally occurring glucosinolates would have been a big advantage to our ancestors and therefore passed through natural selection making it a widespread gene today. This supports the fact that taste aversion is an evolutionary adaptation as our Ancestors would have needed to avoid these naturally occurring glucosinolates to stay alive in our EEA and therefore adapted this gene and passed it on through natural selection.

Innate tendencies do not account for the broad range of food likes and dislikes there is between cultures today. This suggests that our food preferences are due to evolved factors rather than innate tendencies otherwise we would all like the same things. These evolved factors can also be modified by our experiences with different foods with our culture having some influence.

It can be argued that Evolutionary Explanations of food preferences are speculative and based on little or no evidence. Hayes argued that evolutionary psychology has a tendency to ignore ‘null findings’ and facts that do not fit the theory that is being proposed. However it can be argued that all science does this to some extent not just evolutionary psychology. 

Evolutionary Explanations of food preferences can also be seen to be a reductionist approach to eating behaviour. This means that some other factors that may also contribute to our eating behaviour have been forgotten about, such as psychological explanations, in order to focus on evolutionary explanations alone. A more well-rounded study may be more useful than a specific one. However saying it is reductionist may be unfair as all psychological research has to be quite specific to establish a causal relationship. 

Discuss Attitudes to Food and Eating Behaviour (8 & 16 marks)

Culture is a big factor in eating behaviour and most cultures have their own ideas on which foods are allowed to be eaten, when and how they are eaten and how the food should be prepared. These are usually traditional ideas passed on through generations.

Lawrence et al (2007) conducted a study which supported the idea that there are cultural differences in eating behaviour by using discussion groups to investigate factors affecting the eating behaviours of ethnic minorities. He found that although Bangladeshi and Pakistani women took pride in their traditional cooking, they often ate western junk food when time was short. This shows that although people do like to stick to their own traditional eating behaviours they are often influenced by other cultures as well and take on board some of their eating behaviours.

Supporting research into the idea that there are cultural differences in attitudes towards food was also carried out by Lesham (2009) who conducted a series of studies comparing Bedouin women who live in the desert to those who live in an urban setting and both of these to Jewish women. He found that both groups of Bedouin women had very similar eating behaviours but very different to that of the Jewish women. This shows that eating behaviour is linked to culture as the two groups of Bedouin women share a culture but not where they live and they still have very similar eating behaviour but different to those of another culture.

However Lesham’s study only takes into account the nurture effects and ignores the nature part of the nature vs. nurture debate. It has ignored the fact that nature could have an effect on eating behaviour as we have to adapt to live in our environment and eat what we need to survive, especially in the EEA. This argument would be put forward by evolutionary psychologists and should be taken into account alongside the nurture side of this debate when drawing conclusions on our Eating behaviours.

The findings from Lesham’s study are not fully generalizable to the whole population as it was carried out on a small number of ethnic groups which is not a representative sample of people across the world. This therefore affects the population validity of the study.

The validity is also affected by the fact that Lesham’s study was carried out on all women which is a huge gender bias and means that results cannot be fully generalised to the whole population.

Stefansson (1960) also showed that a cultural difference in eating behaviours may exist by finding that Copper Inuits who live on a diet of flesh and roots only and in isolation from other people were disgusted by the taste of sugar. This is very different to the western world, lots of whom have a lot of sugar in their diets. This shows a cultural difference as they have such different ideas about the taste of a food type between two different cultures. 

A key point which undermines the argument is the idea that eating behaviour is affected by culture can be seen to be very one directional as it ignores other explanations such as evolutionary explanations which are also likely to have some influence on our eating behaviours. Therefore a more well-rounded approach may need to be looked at before any conclusions are drawn about influences on eating behaviour. 

Another Factor influencing our eating behaviour is mood. For example when people are sad they tend to eat more or ‘comfort eat’ to make themselves feel better.

Garg et al (2007) conducted a supporting study to show that mood affects eating behaviour by showing 38 participants either a sad movie or a happy movie and observing their eating habits throughout. All participants were given the same amount of popcorn at the start of the movie and how much each person had eaten was measured at the end. It was found that those watching the sad movie ate on average 38% more popcorn than those watching a happy movie. This supports mood as a factor affecting eating behaviour as different eating behaviours were shown between people experiencing two different moods.

However Garg’s study does have some problems with extraneous variables as it is impossible to know how much the participants had eaten before the study, whether or not they actually liked popcorn, and their usual eating habits. All of these things could have affected how much they ate rather than it being their mood. This reduces the validity of the study.       

Outline and Evaluate one or more Social Psychological Theories of Aggression (8 & 16 marks)

One Social Psychological Theory of Aggression is Deindividuation. This says that an individual changes when part of a crowd due to the combination of anonymity, suggestibility and contagion which makes the individual take on a ‘collective mind’ with the rest of the crowd. Because of this they lose all self-control and become capable of acting in a way which goes against social norms and their personality.

People usually refrain from acting in an aggressive way partly because there are social norms which stop this kind of behaviour and partly because they are identifiable as an individual. In a crowd they are anonymous which has the psychological consequences of increasing behaviours that are usually not allowed.

According to Zimbardo, being part of a crowd can take away awareness of our own individuality. In a large crowd every individual is faceless and therefore anonymous, the bigger the crowd the more anonymity you have. Because of this you have less fear of consequences for your actions and a reduced sense of guilt, shame and thought for others.

Mann (1981) conducted a study to support deindividuation as a theory of aggression by analysing US newspaper reports of 21 suicide jumps in the 1960’s and 1970’s. He found that in 10 of these cases a crowd had gathered and baited the jumper. This was more common when the suicide jump had occurred at night and baiting occurred more when the crowd was large and a long distance away.  This supports Deindividuation as a theory of aggression as people only baited the jumper when in a crowd, no one did it alone suggesting that it was the anonymity of the crowd that encouraged it.

This study however is lacking in temporal validity. As it was conducted in the 1960/70’s it cannot be generalized to people nowadays as society has changed a lot since then. Also as it was only carried out in the US the results only apply to society in the US and therefore cannot be generalized across the world making the study lack population validity and have a culture bias. The sample of suicide jumps looked at was a very small sample of only 21 cases and therefore the study lacks reliability as well as validity. This means that it may not support deindividuation as a cause for aggression as well as it first appears to and so other studies should be looked at as well as this one to get a better idea of whether or not deindividuation is a cause for aggression.   

Mann’s study can also be criticized by the fact he looked at newspaper articles of the suicide jumps which tend to be over exaggerated and could mean his study was based on untruthful evidence. Also as it was an observational study he could not control any extraneous variables that could have contributed to his results. His results showed a correlation between a crowd and baiting however as it was a correlation, a causation cannot be found from it meaning his results may not support deindividuation even though they seem to. Again this would mean that more studies need to be looked at to get a good idea of whether deindividuation is a cause of aggression.      

Another Social Psychological Theory of Aggression is the Social Learning Theory. Bandura and Walters (1963) believed that aggression could be learnt through the observation of others. Bandura did a study to support their theory by having one group of children observe adults being aggressive towards a Bobo Doll and one group of children observing the adults being non-aggressive towards the doll. The children then got to interact with the doll themselves and it was found that those who had observed the adults being aggressive towards the doll were a lot more likely to show aggression towards it themselves. This supports the Social Learning Theory as the children showed aggression towards the doll but had not reason to other than watching the adults do it before hand.

There is a big ethical issue with Banduras study as he exposed children to aggressive behaviour knowing that they may produce it in their own behaviour which goes against the British Code of Ethics’ code that researchers have to protect their participants from psychological harm.

It is also possible that there was a lot of demand characteristics in Banduras study and that a lot of the children knew what was expected of them during the study. One child was reported saying ‘there’s the doll we have to hit’ upon arriving to take part in the study. This reduces the internal validity of the study as it means that it was not the observation that caused the aggression in the children in some cases so measures should be taken into account to reduce demand characteristics or to compensate for this if the experiment is ever repeated. 

Discuss the role of Neural and/or Hormonal Mechanisms in Aggression (8 & 16 marks)

Neurotransmitters are chemicals in the brain. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter which has been linked to aggression by inhibiting responses to stimuli which can lead to aggressive responses. Low levels of serotonin have been associated with increased aggression.

Mann et al (1990) did a study to support this by giving 35 healthy male participants a drug which decreases the levels of serotonin in the brain. They then filled out a questionnaire on hostility and aggression and it was found that aggression levels had increased since the drug treatment. This supports the fact that serotonin is linked to aggression as when the participants had lower levels of serotonin than usual their aggression level was higher in all participants which suggested that the serotonin change was the reason for higher aggression levels and not an extraneous variable.

Mann’s study used a self-report method of gaining information from the participants. This reduces the validity of the study as participants could have given answers which they thought were socially desirable or what Mann wanted to hear and not truthful ones which means the conclusions Mann drew form the study could be based on invalid evidence.

Raleigh et al (1991) also conducted a supporting study into serotonin as a factor of aggression where he found that when monkeys were fed on a diet high in tryptophan, which increases levels of serotonin, their aggression levels dropped compared to that of monkeys fed a diet not high in tryptophan. This supports serotonin as a factor in aggression as a change in serotonin levels in the monkeys changed their aggression levels.

Raleigh’s study however is lacking in external validity because it was carried out on animals. It cannot be fully generalized to humans as it cannot be proved that we have the same psychological makeup and therefore our brains may not work in the same way as theirs. This is a big weakness in animal studies and means that this study is not as supporting of serotonin as a factor of aggression as studies that have been carried out on humans.  

Another neurotransmitter which is said to affect aggression is dopamine and high levels of this have been linked to high levels of aggression. There has however no conclusive evidence to show a causal role of dopamine in aggression, research suggests it may be a consequence instead. Couppis and Kennedy (2008) did a study which supported dopamine as more a consequence than a causal factor of aggression by finding that in mice, a reward pathway in the brain becomes engaged in response to aggression and that dopamine is a positive reinforce in this pathway. This suggests that it may be involved in aggression in some way however not actually be a factor for it. This study has the same problems with external validity as Raleigh’s study as it was carried out on mice not humans.

Testosterone is a male sex hormone which is thought to influence aggression due to its action in the areas of the brain which are involved in controlling aggression.  Archer (1991) did a supporting study where he analysed 230 males over five studies and found a positive correlation between aggression and testosterone levels. This would show that testosterone was a factor involved in aggression however as it was a correlational study it can show a relationship between the two but not a causation which means that this study cannot show that testosterone is a cause of aggression.

Dabbs et al (1987) also did a study to support testosterone as a factor of aggression by measuring salivary testosterone levels in violent and nonviolent criminals. He found that those with the highest testosterone levels had a predominantly violent and aggressive history whereas those with the lowest had committed only nonviolent crimes. He found similar results when doing the same experiment on non-criminal communities. This supports testosterone as a factor for aggression as the most aggressive people were found to have the most testosterone across many communities which suggests that it is testosterone having this effect and not another extraneous variable. 

Most studies concerning testosterone and aggression have a huge gender bias. As testosterone is a male sex hormone the majority of studies into the effects of testosterone on aggression are carried out solely on males which means that the results cannot be generalized to females. 

Discuss Research into Institutional Aggression (8 and 16 marks)

Lots of research into institutional aggression was conducted in prisons as it is a good opportunity sample of both aggressive and non-aggressive individuals in an institution. One model that was proposed by Irwin and Ceressey (1962) is the Importation Model which says that prisoners bring their own social histories and traits with them into prisons and this has an influence on how they adapt to a prison environment. They argued that prisoners are not blank slates when they enter prison but import in all normative systems with them.

Harer and Steffensmeier (2006) conducted a study to support the Importation Model where they collected data from 58 US prisons and found that black inmates has a significantly higher violence rate but a lower alcohol and drug misconduct rate than white inmates, which is the same pattern as in US society. This would support the importation model as the same traits found in US society were found in the prisons suggesting that the inmates already possessed them and brought them into prison with them.

This study however cannot be generalised to the whole population as it was only done in the US which may not be a representative sample of the rest of the world and therefore it lacks population validity. Therefore Harer and Steffensmeir might not be as supporting of the Importation models as other studies which have been carried out and should be looked at along with these before any conclusions are drawn.

Gang Memberships in prison has also been linked to Institutional Aggression. Pre Prison gang membership seems to be a determining factor of violence in prison. However DeLisi (2004) conducted some research which undermines this idea and found that those with pre prison gang memberships were no more likely to act violently when in prison than anyone else. He said that the lack of correlation between the two may be down to the fact that in prison violent gang members are isolated form the other members meaning less opportunities for violence. This study can be criticised though by the fact that it is only a correlational study and therefore can never show the causation for the correlation.   

Another model suggested to impact on institutional aggression is the deprivation model which argues that prisoner aggression is the product of stressful and oppressive conditions in the institution itself. This includes crowding and staff experience.

This model was supported by Magaree (1976) who found that aggressive incidents in prisons were negatively correlated to the amount of living space each prisoner had. Also when little space was available for each prisoner strategies were put in place to compensate for this which often results in less inmate interaction which can lead to deprivation also. This supports the deprivation model as it shows that when there is little space and therefore overcrowding prison inmates become more violent.

McCorkle et al (1995) also supported by the deprivation model when he found that overcrowding, lack of privacy and lack of meaningful activity increased peer violence significantly. This would support the deprivation model as it would show that prisoner conditions do in fact influence violence, however this was undermined by Nijman (1999) who found that increased personal space does not in fact decrease violent incidents amongst prisoners. This would undermine the deprivation as if making the conditions better does not decrease violence it would suggest that these were not the cause of it in the first place.

Research into Institutional Aggression has also been done by looking at genocide in which case the institution would be a whole section of society. Dehumanisation was found to be something which fuelled institutional aggression as dehumanising the person you are aggressive towards takes away your moral inhibitions about killing another human as they are not seen to be human at that time.

There are many real world applications for this such as the Jews Holocaust and the Tutsis Rwandan genocide, both of which were dehumanised which meant that normal people off the streets lost all their inhibitions about killing other humans and killed these people with less hesitation.  This would suggest that the aggression was institutional rather than personal as these people would usually not act against social norms in this way.

There is a lot of Gender bias in research into institutional aggression as it is often carried out on prison communities or armed forces which are a predominantly male environment, therefore this research cannot be generalized to communities where it is more mixed or predominantly female. This decreases the validity of the study and is results which needs to be taken into account when drawing any conclusions form these results.

               
Studies into Institutional aggression ignore the nature side of the nature vs. nurture debate as behaviours that are carried out in a community, especially in prisons and armed forces, are down to things which have been learned and are not innate, therefore being nurture rather than nature which could also have an impact on why institutional aggression takes place. 

Discuss Group Displays as an Adaptive Response to Aggression (8 and 16 marks)

Men have adapted to survive better as a group with the larger and more aggressive groups getting the most resources. Nowadays this is most apparent in Sport and War.

Xenophobia, a fear and hatred of strangers of foreigners, is often present at sporting events with the home team showing violence, often in the form of chanting and signals, towards the away team to hold their own territory and the away team showing aggression to try and claim this.

Foldesi (1996) conducted a study to support the link between xenophobia and violent displays by looking at Hungarian football crowds. He found that racist behaviour from a small group of supporters led to an increase in aggressive, particularly xenophobic, outburst towards the opposing team. This would support xenophobia as an adaptive response to aggression as it shows that aggressive acts form a small group can lead to more violent acts from a large group, which would suggest a link to an evolutionary basis of our ancestors standing up for their own people and holding their territory and resources as a group.

Another supporting study was conducted by Evans and Rowe (2002) who looked at police reports from 40 football matches in Europe in 1999/2000 that involved at least one English team or England national team. They found more xenophobic abuse and violent displays in national games rather than club games. They said this could be due to the fact that club teams are more rationally diverse and therefore less likely to produce xenophobic responses from foreign supporters like the national games tend to.

Warfare is another aggressive group display that can be explained in evolutionary terms. In our EEA and through evolution there has been a relatively small number of women to men and therefore the aggressiveness and bravery shown in war, amongst each other and as a group, was used to attract women. However as in most societies a woman soldier is unheard of in term of evolution this is a very gender bias view of group aggression and as all research into this topic is carried out on men rather than women our understanding of it is limited to just the behaviour of men making it non-generalizable to women.

Two studies which support warfare as an adaptive response to aggression were conducted by Palmer and Tilley (1995), who found that young male street gang members have more sexual partners than other young males, and Leunissen and Van Vugt (2010) who found military men have a greater sex appeal but only if they have been observed showing bravery in combat. These studies both support warfare as an adaptive response to aggression as they both show the fact that men who show aggression and bravery are more attractive to women which comes from our ancestors wanting to mate with the male who could protect them the best and get them the best resources.    

A criticism of Group displays as an adaptive response to aggression is that it stresses evolutionary factors which determine agression. This means that it is very on the side of nature in the nature/nurture debate. This is an issue as it does not recognise the value of approaches such as the social learning theory which would explain the influence of nurture in agression. Therefore Group displays as an adaptive response to aggression can be criticized as being too simplistic an explanation and it could be argued that both nature and nurture are important in explaining agression.