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Psychiatry, Psychology and Law

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Social Cognitive Processing in Violent

Male Offenders
a

Loraine Lim , Assoc. Professor Andrew Day & Sharon Casey

a

School of Psychology, Deakin University, Australia

Available online: 11 Jun 2010

To cite this article: Loraine Lim, Assoc. Professor Andrew Day & Sharon Casey (2011): Social
Cognitive Processing in Violent Male Offenders, Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 18:2, 177-189
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Psychiatry, Psychology and Law

Vol. 18, No. 2, May 2011, 177189

Social Cognitive Processing in Violent Male Oenders

Loraine Lim, Andrew Day and Sharon Casey

Downloaded by [University of Leicester] at 10:54 25 March 2012

School of Psychology, Deakin University, Australia

Social cognitive processing decits are widely believed to play a central causal role in
aggressive behaviour. In this study 76 adult male prisoners (38 violent, 38 non-violent)
were presented with a video scenario depicting an interpersonal provocation and asked
to rate their experience of anger and the likelihood of them acting aggressively in
response to the provocation. It was hypothesized that violent oenders would predict
that they would be more likely to act aggressively, feel higher levels of anger, and report
hostile attributions following an interpersonal provocation than non-violent oenders,
but that hostile attributions would be associated with aggression only in those who
scored higher on a measure of trait anger. While the results indicated that violent
oenders reported signicantly higher levels of trait anger and an increased tendency for
hostile attributions than their non-violent counterparts, the interaction was nonsignicant. This suggests that hostile attributions may play a more important role than
trait anger in predicting future acts of aggression, and has implications for the
development of rehabilitation programmes in the treatment of anger and aggression in
oenders.
Key words: aggression; anger; attribution; cognition; oender.

During the last 15 years researchers have

consistently highlighted the important role
that attributions play in inuencing both
anger arousal and aggression (e.g., Quigley
& Tedeschi, 1996; Tiedens, 2001). Of
particular note is the nding that habitually aggressive individuals have a tendency to display a hostile attribution bias;
that is, they perceive the intentions of
others as hostile, particularly when feeling
under threat or when the situation is
ambiguous (Dodge & Crick, 1990; Dodge
& Somberg, 1987; Nasby, Hayden, &
DePaulo, 1979; Tiedens, 2001). The propensity to respond aggressively following

such appraisals appears to increase when

the individual is also high in trait anger, an
individuals general propensity to experience anger and its concomitant components over time (Bettencourt, Talley,
Benjamin, & Valentine, 2006). While different theoretical accounts consistently
identify overly hostile interpretations as
an important component of trait anger
(e.g., Anderson & Bushman, 2002; Berkowitz, 1993), there is no consensus as to how
or when this bias emerges. Moreover, given
that anger does not always lead to an
aggressive response (e.g., in the case of
anger that is overcontrolled; Gross, 1998,

Correspondence: Assoc. Professor Andrew Day, Centre for Oender Reintegration @ Deakin,
School of Psychology, Faculty of Health, Medicine, Nursing and Behavioural Sciences,
Deakin University, Geelong Waterfront Campus, Geelong, Vic. 3217, Australia.
Email: andrew.day@deakin.edu.au
ISSN 1321-8719 print/ISSN 1934-1687 online
2011 The Australian and New Zealand Association of Psychiatry, Psychology and Law
DOI: 10.1080/13218711003739490
http://www.informaworld.com

Downloaded by [University of Leicester] at 10:54 25 March 2012

178

L. Lim et al.

2001; Megargee, 1966), the possibility

exists that hostile interpretations may, in
some circumstances, be a stronger predictor of reactive aggression than trait anger.
The aim of the present study was, rst, to
undertake a preliminary examination of
the inuence of hostile interpretations (in
the form of a hostile attribution bias) on
expectations of reactive aggression in the
face of a perceived provocation and,
second, to explore whether that bias is a
stronger predictor of those expectations
than trait anger.
Prior to any consideration of the
literature in this eld, it is useful to provide
operational denitions of the various constructs under investigation and identify
several key distinctions used, in particular
those relating to anger, aggression, and
hostility. Anger is a term that is commonly
used to refer to an internal emotional
response that has typical physiological
(e.g., general sympathetic arousal), cognitive (e.g., irrational beliefs, automatic
thoughts), phenomenological (e.g., subjective awareness) and behavioural (e.g.,
facial expressions) components (Berkowitz,
1993; Kassinove & Sukhodolsky, 1995). A
further distinction can be made between
state and trait anger. According to
Spielberger (1991), state anger is an
emotional state marked by subjective feelings that vary in intensity from mild
annoyance or irritation to intense fury
and rage (p. 1) whereas trait anger
involves stable individual dierences in
the frequency, duration, and intensity of
state anger (Deenbacher, 1992; Spielberger, 1991). Aggression, in contrast, is
behavioural in nature and dened in terms
of an intention to either physically or
psychologically harm someone or to destroy objects in the environment (Howells,
Daern, & Day, 2008). A distinction can
also be made between aggressive behaviour
in response to feelings of anger (variously
described as aective, hostile or reactive
aggression) and that used in the pursuit of

some goal other than victim harm (referred

to as either instrumental or proactive;
McEllistrem, 2004). Finally, hostility is
generally considered to be cognitive in
nature and incorporates the constructs of
cynicism (i.e., believing others are selshly
motivated), mistrust (i.e., an overgeneralization that others are either hurtful or
intentionally provoking), and denigration
(i.e., evaluating others as dishonest, mean,
and non-social) (Miller, Smith, Turner,
Guijarro, & Hallet, 1996). Trait hostility
is a set of beliefs that others are the source
of frustration and aggression (Smith,
1992), and is considered a stable person
characteristic (Linden et al., 2003) that is
implicated in the faulty processing of social
information (Vranceanu, Gallo, & Bogart,
2006). Individuals who are high on trait
hostility typically exhibit a pattern of social
interaction that involves antagonistic and
aggressive behaviour that is likely to be
reciprocated by others, which, in turn,
increases the likelihood of interpersonal
conict (Vranceanu et al., 2006).
According to attribution theorists, anger and aggression are the outcome of a
specic cognitiveemotionaction sequence
whereby causal attributions about responsibility determine feelings (e.g., anger) that,
in turn, guide subsequent behaviour (e.g.,
aggression; Matthews & Norris, 2002). In
the absence of clear causal explanations,
people typically resort to the use of
schemas (Fiske, 2004), chronically accessible scripts (Crick & Dodge, 1994; Zelli,
Huesmann, & Cervone, 1995), or implicit
theories (Ward, 2000) to anticipate and
predict the behaviour of others or their
social world as well as guide their own
behavioural responses. Although these
various cognitive structures exist largely
outside conscious awareness, however,
there is evidence that some individuals
reappraise incoming stimuli as a means
of re-construing an anger-inducing situation in less hostile terms (i.e., the angry
emotion is not consciously experienced)

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Social Cognition and Aggression in Oenders

(Davey, Day, & Howells, 2005; Gross,
2002).
Early work by Dodge (1980, 1986)
within a developmental social information
processing framework was the rst to show
that habitually aggressive individuals (children) are more likely than their nonaggressive peers to see others as having
hostile intentions, especially in situations of
perceived threat (see Crick & Dodge, 1994
for a review). According to this model, any
behavioural response is a function of
several sequential steps of processing:
accurate encoding; accurate representation
of the encoded information; specication
of an interaction goal; generation of
response alternatives; evaluation of response alternatives; and enactment of the
selected response (Dodge, Pettit, McClaskey, & Brown, 1986). Biased or decient
processing at any stage can lead to deviant,
even aggressive, behaviour.
The hostile attribution bias phenomenon, rst postulated by Nasby et al. (1979)
to explain the responses of aggressive,
emotionally disturbed boys in residential
treatment has since been replicated in a
number of studies including aggressive
boys referred to an outpatient clinic
(Milich & Dodge, 1984), socially maladjusted boys and girls (Aydin & Markova,
1979), adolescent boys and girls (Dodge &
Tomlin, 1987), middle-school-aged children (Sancilio, Plumert, & Hartup, 1989)
as well as real settings in response to
provocation (Steinberg & Dodge, 1982).
In a recent meta-analysis Orobio de Castro, Veerman, Koops, Bosch, and Monshouwer (2002) conrmed the highly
signicant association between hostile attribution of intent and aggressive behaviour, with the eects in 37 of 41 studies
reviewed being in the hypothesized direction (eect sizes ranged from r .29 to
r .65; weighted mean eect r .17). Of
greater interest to the present study is the
relation of this bias to aggression that is
reactive (i.e., aggression as a consequence

179

of anger) rather than proactive (i.e.,

aggression to aid in goal pursuit; Dodge
& Crick, 1990; Dodge & Coie, 1987).
While evidence for the hostile attribution bias has predominantly been replicated in studies involving children, there is
a body of research (albeit somewhat
smaller) that has examined whether the
eect also occurs in adults (e.g., Copello &
Tata, 1990; Epps & Kendall, 1995; Vitale,
Newman, Serin, & Bolt, 2005). In one such
study, Epps and Kendall exposed a group
of undergraduate students to a series of
scenarios that depicted benign, aggressive,
and ambiguous scenes for the purposes of
testing the discriminant validity of the
hostile attribution bias as a cognitive
correlate of anger/aggression. Discriminant
validity of the construct was supported.
Participants who scored higher on a range
of self-reported measures of anger and
aggression not only interpreted non-ambiguous stimuli as signicantly more hostile,
but were signicantly more likely to
attribute hostility to the actions of another
in the absence of sucient evidence for the
objective quantication of that hostility
(i.e., engaged in a hostile attribution bias).
Evidence for the hostile attribution bias
has also been found in oender populations. For example, Copello and Tata
(1990) showed two groups of aggressive
oenders (violent and non-violent) and a
control group (non-aggressive hospital
workers) ambiguously hostile sentences
(e.g., the painter drew the knife). At a
later stage, all participants were given new
versions of the sentences that were either
hostile (e.g., the painter pulled out the
knife) or non-hostile (e.g., the painter
sketched the knife) and asked to rate the
similarity in meaning of the new sentences
to the original. Both oender groups were
more likely than controls to report that
hostile versions of the sentences were more
similar. More recently, Vitale et al. (2005)
tested the possibility of two pathways
for hostile attributions: one related to

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180

L. Lim et al.

psychopathy (assessed via the Psychopathy

ChecklistRevised) (Hare, 1991) and the
other to a depressogenic attributional
style (measured with the Inferential
Styles of Questionnaire) (Rose, Abramson,
Hodluck, & Halberstadt, 1994). While
results supported the existence of two
distinct pathways, depressogenic attributional style was found to be inuential only
in the case of African American oenders.
According to the authors, the depressogenic pathway represents a tendency for
individuals to make more broad-based
negative attributions (i.e., which include
the self, others, and the world). By
comparison, the second pathway was said
to be unrelated to this broad attributional
style, associated instead with the personality construct of psychopathy. Because
psychopathy is, in part, dened by hostile,
callous and self-serving attitudes towards
others, the authors suggested that the
hostile attributions made by these individuals were a reection of their underlying
personality characteristics.
A consistent theme in the research
reviewed herein is that the association
between the biased interpretation of social
information and individual dierences in
aggressive outcomes appear to be directly
linked to individual dierences in anger
(Cohen, Eckhardt, & Schagat, 1998; Tiedens, 2001). Support for this proposition
comes via three sources of empirical ndings. First, there is the evidence of a direct
link between hostile interpretations and
trait anger (e.g., Epps & Kendall, 1995;
Wingrove & Bond, 2005); second, research
has repeatedly shown an association between reactive but not proactive aggression
and the hostile attribution bias (e.g., Crick
& Dodge, 1996; Dodge & Coie, 1987); and,
third, anger has been found to mediate the
link between interpretational biases and
aggression (Graham, Hudley, & Williams,
1992). Based on this body of evidence,
Wilkowski and Robinson (2008) have used
a dual-process model of attribution (Trope,

1996) to conclude that a trait-linked hostile

interpretation bias relies on automatic
inference processes. If this assumption is
correct, then it may be possible to correct
such biases. For example, more careful and
prolonged processing of information has
been shown to eliminate hostile interpretations (Dodge & Newman, 1981), as does
thinking about situations from a more
objective, third-person perspective (Dodge
& Frame, 1982; Sancilio et al., 1989).
Despite ample support for an association between hostility and anger or aggression, there is a dearth of published research
examining hostile attributions in people
known to have acted violently (one notable
exception is the Copello & Tata 1990 study
described above). Moreover, where an
oender population has been the focus of
study, the goal has typically been to
dierentiate between psychopathic and
non-psychopathic individuals in terms of
hostile inferences and subsequent attributions, rather than establishing whether
hostility is related to acts of violence
(Bettman, Yazar, & Rove, 1998; Serin,
1991; Vitale et al., 2005). Violent oenders
who score high on measures of psychopathy are a unique subgroup in the prison
population, and not likely to be representative of all violent oenders. There is
evidence, for example, that psychopathic
individuals can engage in aggressive acts in
the absence of anger (e.g., Serin, 1991;
Vitale et al., 2005). Consequently, the
ndings from studies involving this group
may not be generalizable across the whole
violent oender population.
A predisposition towards anger is
associated with many forms of interpersonal violence and serious violent oending
(e.g., Howells, 2004; Knight & Prentky,
1990; Kroner, Reddon, & Serin, 1992).
Individuals who are high in trait anger are
also more likely to make hostile attributions for behaviour that they experience as
provocative, which leads to higher levels of
anger arousal and, ultimately, increases the

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Social Cognition and Aggression in Oenders

risk of aggressive behaviour (Bettancourt
& Blair, 1992). Yet despite this wellestablished link, there has been little consideration of the role of hostile attributions
and the aggressive tendencies of violent
oenders. The aim of this study is to
redress this shortcoming by investigating
the association between hostile attributions, trait anger, and the self-reported
intent of violent oenders to act aggressively in response to an ambiguous everyday social situation. Based on the
preceding review of the literature, it is
hypothesized that violent oenders will not
only score higher on measures of trait
anger, but that they will also score higher
on levels of state anger, be more likely to
display evidence of a hostile attribution
bias, and report a greater likelihood that
they would act aggressively following an
interpersonal provocation than their nonviolent counterparts.
As previously noted, it is possible for
some individuals to behave aggressively in
the absence of anger (most notably psychopaths, although this tendency has also
been found in children; Crick & Dodge,
1996). For this reason, the present study
will also examine whether it is hostile
attributions rather than trait anger per se
that more strongly predicts the perceived
likelihood that an individual will respond
aggressively when provoked. The second
hypothesis, therefore, is that measures of
hostile attribution will be a stronger predictor of the self-reported intent to act
aggressively in response to provocation
than will trait anger. Finally, it may be
that hostile attributions are associated with
aggression only in those individuals who
have a greater general propensity for anger
arousal, namely those who are higher in
trait anger. If this is true, it may suggest
that interventions that aim to reduce the
risk of violent behaviour through changing
the attributions that individuals make for
the behaviour of others would be more
successful if targeted at those individuals

181

with high levels of trait anger, rather than

at all violent oenders. Thus, the third
hypothesis in this study is that the interaction between trait anger and hostile attributions will be a stronger predictor of a
likely aggressive response than either trait
anger or hostile attribution alone.
Method
Participants
A total of 92 randomly selected convicted
male prisoners in two correctional institutions in Singapore prisons who met the
criteria for entry into an oence-related
rehabilitation programme were invited to
take part in the study. All oenders were of
at least a high moderate level of risk for reoending. Of those approached by the
rst-named researcher, 78 oenders aged
between 18 and 57 years (M 34.29 years,
SD 1.19) agreed to participate. Subsequent data screening for missing data and
incorrect data entry indicated two outliers
that were removed from the sample, leaving a nal sample size of 76 with equal
numbers of violent and non-violent oenders in each group (N 38).
All the oenders, who came from a
range of cultural backgrounds (including
Chinese, Malay, Indian, and Eurasian),
had the requisite level of spoken and
written English to complete the questionnaires. The sample consisted of mainly
long-term prisoners (average sentence
length 6 years 9 months, SD 4.13
years), who had been incarcerated for
some time (average length of time in
prison 3 years 2 months, SD 2.47
years). Participants were classied as either
violent (N 40) or non-violent (N 38)
based on the main (index) charge that led
to their conviction. Violent crimes were
dened as including crimes such as murder,
assault, robbery, and use of weapons
(categorized as violence without bodily
harm, violence with bodily harm, grievous
bodily harm, and injuries causing death).

182

L. Lim et al.

Non-violent crimes were those that were

either non-interpersonal or did not involve
aggression (e.g., fraud, drug oences,
theft, obstructing justice, and motor
oences).

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Materials and Measures

Vignette
An interpersonal provocation involving a
social transgression was presented to the
participants in the form of a 45-s video
vignette. The vignette was lmed from the
point of view of an unseen protagonist, so
that the camera serves as the eyes of the
participant. It depicted the protagonist
waiting for a car to leave a parking space,
which is subsequently abruptly occupied by
another driver. In light of research suggesting that individual dierences in anger
arousal are more pronounced under conditions of ambiguity (Hazebroek, Howells,
& Day, 1999), the provocation was lmed
in an ambiguous manner (i.e., the driver is
seen in prole and does not look directly at
the protagonist). Participants were asked
to identify with the protagonist in the
scenario. The vignette was previously
used by Hazebroek et al. but with dierent
narrators. In that study, high trait individuals were shown to attribute more blame
to the antagonist, more readily identied
another as the antagonist, more readily
identied circumstances as being of relevance to their own interests, and responded
more angrily to the same events than did
individuals with low trait anger.
Likelihood of Reactive Aggression
The self-reported likelihood of engaging in
reactive aggression (aggression expectancy)
was measured with three single self-report
item questions asking each participant to
rate the likelihood that he would shout at
the driver, hit the driver, and swear at
the driver of the van on a 5-point Likert
scale from 1 (very unlikely) to 5 (very

likely). Scores on all of these items were

combined into a total score, with higher
scores indicating a greater self-reported
likelihood that the person would react
aggressively to perceived provocation.
While internal consistency reliability on
this measure was low (Cronbachs
a .43), given that the scale consisted of
only three items and had high face validity,
it was considered suitable for the purposes
of analysis.
StateTrait Anger Expression Inventory 2
This is a 57-item inventory that measures
the intensity of anger as an emotional state
(State Anger) and the disposition to
experience angry feelings as a personality
trait (Trait Anger) (Spielberger, 1999). The
State Anger scale was used to measure
anger arousal and included items such as I
am furious, and I feel screaming, rated
on a 4-point Likert-type scale ranging from
1 (not at all), to 4 (very much so). The 10item Trait Anger scale, which consists of
items such as I am quick tempered and
When I get frustrated, I feel like hitting
someone, is also rated on a 4-point Likert
type scale ranging from 1 (almost never) to
4 (almost always). Higher scores on the
trait anger scale indicate that an individual
has a greater predisposition towards anger.
Spielberger has reported internal consistency reliability (Cronbachs a) for the total
scale as ranging from .73 to .95 and from
.73 to .93 for the subscales (State and Trait
scales reported as ranging from .84 to .93).
Internal consistency reliability in the present study was moderate, with all subscales
exceeding .71.
Hostile Interpretations Questionnaire
The Hostile Interpretations Questionnaire
(HIQ) Simourd & Mamuza, 2000, 2002) is
a vignette-style inventory based on the
hostile attribution bias (Nasby et al.,
1979). The HIQ is designed to assess (a)

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Social Cognition and Aggression in Oenders

an individuals overall level of self-reported
hostility and (b) self-reported hostility
within several social contexts. The 35-item
self-report measure consists of seven vignettes representing a broad range of common social situations (e.g., Fred invites a
few friends to his house, and when he
walked in, his common-law wife complains
about how late he is). There are ve
questions for each vignette (e.g., How
likely do you think it is that his wife always
nags Fred), each of which is scored on a 5point Likert-type scale. Item scores are
aggregated such that there is an overall
measure of hostility, a measure of hostility
for each social situation, and measures of
dierent components of hostility. Social
situations (i.e., sources of hostility) include
authority relationships, intimate/family relationships, acquaintance relationships,
work relationships, and anonymous
relationships. Based on an individuals
responses to the vignettes, four subcomponents of hostility are then computed:
Overgeneralization (pervasive hostility
based on limited information), Attribution
of Hostility (hostility attributed to others),
Hostile Reaction (likelihood of responding
in a hostile manner), and External Blame
(degree of blame toward others for own
hostility) by summing scores on the
constituent components. Higher scores
indicate a greater propensity for hostility.
Validation studies have shown that the
measure has moderately high internal
consistency reliability (Cronbachs a
.86; Simourd & Mamuza, 2000). Internal
consistency reliability in the present study
was moderate (Cronbachs a .76). The
moderate correlations between the HIQ
and other anger/hostility measures (Aggression Questionnaire [AQ], Buss & Perry,
1992; Novaco Anger Scale [NAS] Novaco,
1994) are indicative of construct validity,
while low correlations with the Paulhus
Deception Scale (Paulhus, 1998) indicate
that the measures is less vulnerable to
respondent manipulations than either the

183

AQ or the NAS (Simourd & Mamuza,

2000).
Procedure
Potential participants were identied by a
prison sta member and asked to convene
in groups at a specially allocated room in
each prison, at which time the purpose of
the search was explained and participants
were provided with written information
about the study. No incentives were oered
for participation (nor were there disincentives for non-participation). Those with
literacy problems and/or those from nonEnglish-speaking backgrounds were excluded, as were those whose violence was
predominately sexual or family orientated
(given that such oenders are widely
considered to have a unique set of needs;
Serin & Preston, 2001). Participants were
then invited to watch the video vignette and
complete the self-report measures. Instructions were given verbally throughout the
study, and assistance was given as required
to any participant who experienced diculty with either the instructions or the
questionnaire. The entire process took
approximately 45 min for each participant
and was followed by a short debrieng
session with each group of participants to
provide contact information, to address
any issues or concerns, and to clinically
monitor any potential risk of harm to other
inmates (after watching the anger-inducing
car park scenario).
Results
To test the rst hypothesis that violent
oenders would score higher on measures
of trait and state anger, interpret greater
levels of hostile intent (i.e., subscribe to a
hostile attribution bias) and report an
increased level of aggressive expectancy
following interpersonal provocation than
their non-violent counterparts, an independent samples t test was conducted (Table 1).

184

L. Lim et al.

Table 1. State Anger, Trait Anger, Hostile Attribution, and Self-Reported Likelihood of
Aggression (N 78).
VIOLENT
Item
State Anger
Trait Anger
Hostile Attributions
Aggression Expectancy

NON-VIOLENT

SD

SD

24.87
19.84
87.05
8.42

6.86
6.27
16.16
2.93

23.08
17.00
78.53
7.00

6.71
3.78
12.04
3.12

1.15
2.39*
2.61*
2.05*

.26
.55
.60
.47

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Note. *p 5 .05.

As predicted, signicant between-group

dierences with moderate to large eect
sizes were noted in ratings of aggressive
expectancy, trait anger, and hostile attribution bias. An examination of the mean
scores showed that violent oenders scored
higher on all three measures. No signicant
dierence was found between the two
groups on the measure of state anger (i.e.,
anger arousal).
The hypotheses that (a) measures of
hostile attribution rather than trait anger
would be a stronger predictor of aggression
expectancy to a perceived provocation, and
(b) the interaction between trait anger and
hostile attributions would be a stronger
predictor of aggression expectancy to a
perceived provocation than either trait
anger or hostile attribution alone were
examined using hierarchical regression. In
order to test the latter hypothesis, it was
rst necessary to calculate the interaction
of trait anger and hostile attributions. This
involved the scores on both measures being
centred and the interaction term calculated
by multiplying these centred scores. Correlations between all variables used in
analysis are provided in Table 2.
In testing the second and third hypotheses, the regression model was found to be
signicantly dierent from zero at the end
of each step. At Step 1, with only oence
type in the equation, R .24, Finc(1,
74) 4.26, p 5 .05; at Step 2 with the
addition of trait anger and hostile attributions, R .57, Finc(3, 72) 11.32,

Table 2.

Bivariate Correlations (N 78).

VARIABLE
Aggression
Expectancy
(AE)
State Anger
(SA)
Trait Anger
(TA)
Hostile
Attribution
Bias (HAB)
Hostile
Attribution
Bias 6 Trait
Anger
(HAB 6 TA)

AE

SA

TA

HAB

.64**

.46**

.52**

.54*** .62**
.26*

.32*

.62**

.44*

Note. *p 5 .05; **p 5 .01; ***p 5 .001.

p 5 .001; and at Step 3, with all independent variables in the equation, R .57,
Finc(4, 71) 8.45, p 5 .001. The full
model accounted for 28% (R2adj .28) of
the total variance in aggression expectancy
to perceived provocation. As predicted by
the second hypothesis, hostile attribution
bias (b .39, t 3.15, p 5 .01) was a
stronger predictor of aggression expectancy than trait anger (b .19, t 1.55,
p 4 .05). The third hypothesis, that hostile
attributions would be associated with
aggression for those with higher trait anger
scores, was not supported; the addition of
the interaction term did not result in a
signicant increment in R2. The only
variable that remained signicant at Step
3 was hostile attribution bias (b .40,

185

Social Cognition and Aggression in Oenders

Table 3.

Hierarchical Regression of Aggression Expectancy (N 78).

VARIABLES

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Step 1
Oence type
Step 2
Oence type
Trait Anger
Hostile attributions
Step 3
Oence type
Trait Anger
Hostile attributions
Trait Anger 6 Hostile Attribution
Bias interaction

.60

.23*

.23
.11
.08

.09
.19
.39**

.21
.10
.08
.002

.08
.19
.40**
.05

R2

R2adjusted

.23

.05

.04

.57

.32

.29

.57

.32

.28

R2change

.27***

Note. *p 5 .05; **p 5 .01; ***p 5 .001.

t 3.16, p 5 .01). Table 3 provides the

unstandardized regression coecients (B),
standardized regression coecients (b), R,
R2, and R2change at each stage of the
analysis.
Discussion
The primary aim of this study was to
investigate whether individual dierences
in cognitive processing, namely a hostile
attributional bias, could account for dierences in anger and aggressive expectancy in
response to a seemingly innocuous event, in
a sample of violent and non-violent oenders. As predicted, oenders in the sample
who had been convicted of violent crimes
were more likely than their non-violent
counterparts to indicate an intent to
respond aggressively to the targets behaviour, a nding consistent with previous
work by Hazebroek et al. (1999). Violent
oenders were also found to have higher
trait anger and were more likely to interpret the behaviour of others as having
hostile intent; in other words, they subscribed to a hostile attribution bias. While
the former is not unsurprising, given the
association between anger and interpersonal violence (e.g., Howells, 2004; Knight &
Prentky, 1990; Kroner et al., 1992),

the latter nding warrants further consideration. Given that previous research by
Copello and Tata (1990) found no dierence between violent and non-violent
oenders in the tendency to make hostile
attributions, it raises several questions. The
rst is whether the results in this study are
simply an artefact of population dierences. In the Copello and Tata study, both
groups of oenders were identied as high
on aggression (although no indication was
given on how this was established). It may
simply be that the non-violent oenders in
this study had very low levels of aggression.
An alternative, and more likely explanation, is the identied link between trait
anger and the tendency to make hostile
attributions (e.g., Epps & Kendall, 1995).
This is certainly supported by the strength
of the correlation between these two
variables. Another explanation is the lack
of signicant dierence between the two
oender groups on self-reported levels of
anger arousal (i.e., state anger). Although
this nding is consistent with previous
reports that anger arousal is neither a
necessary nor sucient condition for aggression in many violent oenders (e.g.,
Zelli et al., 1995), it is highly likely that in
the absence of an attribution of hostile
intent, there is no angry response (or one

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186

L. Lim et al.

that is much lower in valence to that

experience by violent oenders).
In terms of the relative contribution of
trait anger and hostile intent to the
prediction of future aggressive behaviour,
ndings from the regression analysis provided support for the second hypothesis
but not the third. Perceptions of hostile
intent explained twice as much variance in
aggressive expectancy (39%) as compared
to that explained by trait anger (19%). This
nding not only provides further support
for the discriminant validity of the hostile
attribution bias, it also adds weight to the
dual process model of attribution (Trope,
1996). According to the model, attributions
are automatic, occurring at the very early
stages of social information, which would
lead it to take precedence over any other
processing task. One might therefore expect trait anger to be a stronger predictor
in cases where people have more time to
make a decision or are instructed to
consider the consequences of their actions.
Given the consequences of aggressive
actions, distinguishing between the two
constructs certainly warrants further investigation. Additional support for the greater
inuence of hostile intent as compared to
trait anger is evident in the failure of a
Trait Anger 6 Hostile Attribution Bias
interaction to signicantly predict the likelihood of an aggressive response. In fact,
the interaction had minimal inuence on
the prediction, while hostile intent became
marginally stronger.
While these ndings have relevance
from a theoretical perspective, the applied
implications of the results are perhaps of
greatest utility. Of particular signicance is
highlighting the need to assess for both
hostile attribution bias and trait anger
when determining the appropriateness of
a referral to a therapeutic programme
(Novaco, 1997), and that the combination
of unrealistic attributions of intent during a
provoking situation and high levels of trait
anger should both be key targets for

change in treatment for violent individuals

(Grodnitzky & Tafrate, 2000). Research
has shown that interventions designed to
reduce the hostile attribution bias are
eective in lessening tendencies toward
anger and aggression. This has been illustrated by Guerra and Slaby (1990), whose
treatment programme to correct a variety
of cognitive biases linked to aggression,
including the hostile attribution bias, was
found to successfully reduce reactive aggression in adolescents. Hudley and
Graham (1993) had similar success with a
treatment programme to reduce anger and
aggression in children. That said, some
aggressive individuals will require alternative
approaches, especially if they over-control
their anger (Davey et al., 2005), or have a
pathologically low level of arousal to interpersonal interactions, as may be the case for
those with psychopathic traits. Given that
violent oenders, however, are generally
more likely to score higher on measures of
trait anger and that trait anger appears to be
strongly associated with the tendency to
assume hostile attribution intent, this study
oers support for the delivery of cognitive
behavioural programmes that incorporate
activities that involve exposure to provocation and seek to equip violent oenders with
the skills to make non-hostile attributions for
such provocations.
The study is not without its limitations.
For example, self-report on the measure of
aggression expectancy to perceived provocation is fraught with diculty in terms of
socially desirable responding. Future research should include such a measure to
establish whether the dierences noted
in the present study between violent and
non-violent oenders are reliable. Another
consideration is the dierence between
reporting intent (i.e., aggression expectancy) and actually engaging in such
behaviour. A range of antecedent factors
inuences how people respond to provocation (ambiguous or otherwise) and a true
test of association between the hostile

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Social Cognition and Aggression in Oenders

attribution bias and aggressive or violent
behaviour would need to be more ecologically sound. Finally, it is possible that
other factors may have inuenced the
extent to which either anger or hostility
inuenced aggression expectancy. One such
factor is the degree to which prolonged
attention is paid to the negative information. There is evidence that individuals who
report increased tendencies toward angry
rumination demonstrate much higher levels
of trait anger (Berry, Worthington, OConnor, Parrott, & Wade, 2005; Martin &
Dahlen, 2005). These individuals have also
been found to exhibit prolonged tendencies
toward aggressive behaviour following a
provocation (Collins & Bell, 1997). The
other consideration, and one alluded to in
the introduction, is the role of eortful
control (or emotional regulation), which
has been associated with reduced trait
anger (Gross, 2002; Posner & Rothbart,
2000). Despite these limitations, the study
provides a useful rst step in understanding
the role of the hostile attribution bias in
violent oenders.
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the support of
the Singapore Prison Service. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors
and do not necessarily reect those of the
Singapore Prison Service.

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