STUDIES OF VIOLENT AND NONVIOLENT MALE PAROLEES .1. LABORATORY AND PSYCHOMETRIC MEASUREMENTS OF AGGRESSION

Male parolees were recruited into a laboratory study to determine the relationship between their previous aggression history, psychometric m easures of aggression, and behavioral measures of aggressive respondin g using a laboratory methodology: the Point Subtraction Aggression par adigm. Subjects were assigned to a violent or nonviolent group based u pon their criminal history. Subjects participated in sessions in which they were given three response options defined as: (1) nonaggressive responding which earned money, (2) aggressive responding which ostensi bly subtracted money from another fictitious person, (This responding was defined as aggressive since it resulted in the ostensible delivery of an aversive stimulus (subtraction of money) to another person), an d (3) escape which protected the subject's earnings from subtractions initiated by the other person, Results indicated that the violent subj ects emitted significantly more aggressive responses than subjects in the nonviolent group, The number of aggressive responses parolees emit ted was significantly correlated with most psychometric measures of ag gression, This study provides external validity for our laboratory mea surement of human aggressive responding, since aggressive responding w as directly related to violent criminal histories. (C) 1997 Society of Biological Psychiatry.