Aggression in the general Swedish population, measured with a new self-rating inventory: The Aggression Questionnaire - revised Swedish version (AQ-RSV)

The aim of the present study was to develop a Swedish self-rating instrumen t for clinical aggression research based on the American Aggression Questio nnaire (AQ), which measures physical aggression, verbal aggression, anger, and hostility. To test this adapted Aggression Questionnaire-revised Swedis h version (AQ-RSV), it was mailed to 781 randomly selected individuals, age d 20-40 year. A total of 497 (64%) evaluable AQ-RSV inventories were obtain ed and analyzed statistically. Drop-out analysis showed that non-responders were most often male and significantly older than responders. Among the re sponders, AQ-RSV showed significant sex differences in all aggression subsc ales except Hostility. Aggression was found to vary with age, geographical region, and size of home community. The AQ and the AQ-RSV were comparable i n correlations between the four aggression subscales and in alpha coefficie nts, which indicated considerable internal consistency. Development of the aggression-measuring instrument for Swedish conditions is important not onl y to study subtraits of aggression but to enable analyses of their relation ships to neurobiological and psychiatric variables.