Although many studies have reported a decrease of direct aggression in adolescence, the reasons for this decrease have remained somewhat of a puzzle. To address this issue, it was examined to what extent the decrease in direct aggression during adolescence can be explained by focusing on the interdependence of status and affection goals. Adolescents have both of these social goals and their realization is likely to have a profound impact on the interaction among peers. On the one hand, direct aggression can be an effective way to realize status. At the same time, direct aggression also lowers affection from the targets of aggression as well as from other peers. As the social circles of interaction within which status and affection are realized become more integrated during adolescence due to developmental changes, i.e., both affection and status are to a large extent provided by the peer group, the use of direct aggression for realizing status becomes increasingly costly in terms of losing affection. Thus, by middle adolescence, when the realization of status and affection goals have become dependent on the same circle of peers, socially determined direct aggression should be explained by the relative strength of status and affection goals: the combination of strong status and relatively weak affection goals.
A preliminary test was provided of these age-specific hypotheses using unique secondary data that contained, next to direct aggression, measures of both status and affection goals. In line with the hypotheses, it was shown that status goals are associated with direct aggression throughout adolescence. This finding echoes previous empirical research, showing that at this age status can be pursued via direct forms of aggression (Caravita and Cillessen
2012; Ojanen and Findley-Van Nostrand
2014). It was also found that, as hypothesized, in preadolescence and early adolescence, affection goals do not affect the association between status goals and direct aggression. This is in line with earlier work showing that at young ages, children seem to be able to use direct aggression without much concern for the loss of affection (Huitsing and Monks
2018). Conversely, the current findings corroborated the hypothesis that for older adolescents, status goals are more strongly associated with direct aggression, but only when youths have lower levels of affection goals. Because having weak affection goals is relatively rare, direct aggression decreases for older adolescents compared to preadolescence and early adolescence.
Implications
The larger significance of these findings may lie in what they suggest about the age-related development of direct aggression and with regard to possible interventions to reduce the likelihood of direct aggression. Based on the current research, it seems worth-while to pay attention to the overlap of social circles in which status and affection are realized. This overlap may differ for different contexts in and out of school, in an out of work, et cetera. To the degree that they overlap, direct aggression is less likely caused by the social context. The overlap increases less and less with age for the achievement of status because of the stronger overlap of status and affection social circles. This overlap means that direct aggression will not lead to the desired result; that it is not considered acceptable; and that there are more varied alternatives to achieve status without losing affection. If true, direct aggression would with age become increasingly a matter of personality characteristics rather than social context.
An important caveat is a possibly temporary contrasting effect of an
increased link between status and aggression in mid-adolescence because in this developmental period directly aggressive youths represent a challenge to adult roles and values (Pellegrini and Long
2002). Thus, one might speculate that this in-group-out-group effect of youths versus adults makes the use of aggression for the achievement of status less costly, creating what Hawley et al. (
2008) called the “the peer regard–aggression paradox”, an effect that was also found by others (Dijkstra et al.
2008). However, in support of the current findings, this increased acceptability of aggression for the achievement of status may be rather temporary and could wear off as peer and romantic relationships become increasingly important (see also Pellegrini and Long
2002).
With regard to interventions, the current research encourages the development of programs in schools that explicitly deal with the realization of status and affection. For example, this relationship could be explicitly discussed in classrooms, and it could be emphasized that the use of direct aggression for the achievement of status is not only counterproductive (in terms of loss of affection) but also a display of behavior that is done by young children rather than by more mature people. In this way, the very use of direct aggression may become counterproductive in terms of status. In addition, schools could target youths who have strong status and weak affection goals. Specifically for them, alternative ways to achieve status may be devised (see for example Ellis et al.
2016). Conversely, schools may try to increase the salience of affection goals. For example, self-disclosure, known to facilitate affective relationships, could be trained (Tokic and Pecnik
2010), along with training in empathy (Zaki
2019).
Future research may expand on the current findings in a number of ways. For example, it may focus explicitly on changes in the ways affection is realized, and trace systematic differences in various social contexts with regard to the changes in overlap of social circles in which status and affection are realized. Importantly, intergroup relations might be particularly interesting. For example, Coleman (
1961) showed that in the United States, interscholastic competition in non-violent sports led to an increased compatibility of status (based on skills for winning from the out-group) and affection within the in-group. Quite generally, the availability of multiple ways to achieve status and their relationship to the achievement of affection could become a focus for future research.
Limitations and Strengths
The findings should be interpreted against the backdrop of several limitations. First, peer-reported aggression was assessed in slightly different ways in the three samples. In Samples 1 and 3, same- and cross-sex peer nominations were used to assess direct aggression, whereas in Sample 2 peer nominations were only administered for same-sex peers. In addition, compared to Samples 1 and 2, in Sample 3 a shorter instrument was used to assess direct aggression with slightly different items. Yet, all items clearly assessed physical, observable forms of aggression or the threat thereof. Moreover, merging different samples to study goal-aggression associations and mapping age-related differences in these links means that cohort effects cannot be excluded and that changes within and between individuals cannot be studied. Thus, future research would benefit from assessing longitudinal relationships between social goals and direct aggression in a longitudinal design that allows for studying these developments during adolescence within the same set of individuals.
Next, the subscale Communal and Submissive goals that was used to calculate the status and affection goal vector scores, showed low internal consistency. It could be that this subscale reflects a somewhat broader construct that cannot be assessed easily with only four items. It is thus important to replicate the current findings with a more optimal assessment of social goals.
Although the three samples included youths from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds, all studies were conducted in Finland, which limits the generalizability of the current findings to other cultures and ethnicities. Moreover, Finland is a country that invests much in reducing aggression in school (Persson et al.
2018), which may influence how aggression is viewed by youths and thus how it is related to social goals.
However, one message of this study is that attention should be paid to the overlap of circles for achieving status and affection. These overlaps do not just differ by age (this study), but very likely also by culture and other social circumstances. For example, clique formation in classrooms may allow status achievement via aggression towards other cliques, while realizing affection inside one’s own clique (Pattiselanno et al.
2016). Thus, clique formation (possibly based on heterogeneity in classrooms) may keep status and affection circles further separated for a longer time in the developmental process. In addition, it cannot be excluded that in certain communities, rates of direct aggression may be higher and are driven by goals and motivations related to retaliation and survival (e.g., in low-income urban areas, see Aceves et al.
2010). In these contexts, the link between status goals and direct aggression may be less contingent upon having weak affection goals, but could reflect individuals’ willingness to fight back and stand their ground when teachers fail to intervene adequately (see also Veenstra et al.
2014).
Finally, although the current study captured a substantial part of adolescence, there was no information on (early) childhood and late adolescence (i.e., age 16–18 years). If the theoretical notions and empirical findings hold, it would be expected that in childhood parents play an important role in both shaping and satisfying social goals. At that age, both status and affection goals may be difficult to assess, may not yet be clearly present, and may not be related to direct aggression. In late adolescence, it can be expected that the interaction between status and affection goals is more pronounced when it comes to explaining direct aggression. Future research is needed to extend the current research by assessing social goals in a larger age range in a longitudinal design.
Notwithstanding these limitations, a methodological strength of this project was that status and affection goals were assessed directly and via the same instrument across multiple studies. Measuring social goals or motives for social interaction directly is still rare and using the same instrument across studies may excuse a number of minor methodological differences between them. Moreover, a coherent goal-related framework was provided for tracing social influences on the use of direct aggression, linked to an age-increasing integration of social circles within which status and affection goals are being realized. Finally, hypotheses were empirically tested about age effects concerning social determinants of direct aggression. It was shown that the association between status goals and direct aggression changes across adolescence as a function of the importance of affection goals and the concomitant cost of achieving status by direct aggression.