The Nature of Aggression (or is it Nurture) Essay

The Nature of Aggression (or is it Nurture?) Every night on the news there are reports about murders, wars, and rapes. But the news isnt the only place where people encounter violent or aggressive behavior. Driving home from work, people get cut off and cussed at on a daily basis. At school, children fight over who will be the first in the lunch line. On the street, people get pushed out of the way if they are not walking fast enough. The list could go on and on and on. The point is that humans exhibit aggressive behavior on a regular basis. However, does anyone know why people display these behaviors? Why do certain people seem more aggressive? Is there just one thing that controls when and how aggressive someone becomes? These are†¦show more content†¦The nature vs. nurture topic has been a continuing debate for many aspects of human behavior, including aggression. There have been many studies indicating that chemical relationships between serotonin, testosterone, and frontal lobe brain chemistry may play a key role in determining aggressive behavior, while other studies have explored environmental and societal factors that have been said to control patterns in human aggression. The argument for nature surrounds the possible biological reasons for why human aggression is exhibited. The reasons for why there is aggressive behavior in humans include a range of hypotheses. Aggression may have a chemical, hormonal, or genetic basis. Research has shown that stimulation of certain parts of animals brains leads to aggression. Stimulation of other parts stops aggression (1). Some researches believe that it stems from low levels of serotonin. Terrie Moffitt and colleagues studied the blood serotonin levels of 781 21-year-old men and women. The researchers report that in this study, elevated whole blood serotonin was characteristic of violent men. (Low brain levels of serotonin, but high levels of blood serotonin, are associated with behavior disorders-apparently because of serotonins different origin and function in blood and brain.) The violent mens mean serotonin level was .48 standard deviations (SD) above the norm for males as a group, and .56 SD above the mean f or non-violent men. AmongShow MoreRelatedAggression Is It ‘Nature’ or ‘Nurture’2434 Words   |  10 PagesAggression is it ‘Nature’ or ‘Nurture’ During our lifetime every one of us feels anger and aggression occasionally, some more than others, maybe as a child in the play ground or later as an adult when somebody cuts you up when you are driving along. But what causes anger and aggression and why do we all suffer from it? Well there are lots of different theories to what causes aggression and where aggressive behaviour comes from. 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