Agresividad y violencia cómo se plantea el tema en psicología

Abstract

Is aggressiveness a phenomenon which is linked strictly to the individual characteristics of personality, or does it depend, on the contrary, more likely upon social conditioners? On the other hand, does the undeniable destructive capacity to be found in man obey certain innate and inherited psycho-biological structures, or is it incorporated during the individual's personal and social development? And, in the concrete case of violence of a socio-political nature, which is incubated and put into practice by aggressive groups, what is the structural and associative orgazation of these groups, and what is its mutual influence upon the members that make them up? These are the most intricate knots which the psychological sciences have been trying to undo,within the ever suggestive and disturbing topic of aggressiveness. The results to date have been dissimilar. The cohesion and radicalness of the aggressive group has beenbetter understood, but the phenomenon of the de-personalization of its members is stHI largely unexplainable. More importance has be en given to the influence of educative factors -in a wide' sense- while the secondary role of frustration, catharsis, etc. was being discovered. However, vital fields are yet to be explored, such as the aims of aggressiveness and the process of gestation of the decisions which eventually lead to violent action. These defficiencies are understandable because the finality of human behaviour and its free configuration can be resolved only with a wider and more profound anthropological perspective than can be achieved within the empirical disciplines. However, due to the scientific prejuidice, the ideologies of violence tend to present their own vision with regard to the topic, with arguments which the psychological disciplines can not honorably put forth. It is necessary, if one wishes to treat the argument with a minimum of seriousness, to take apart all equivocations. Attribute, then, to Psychology that which belongs to it. Recognize, on the other hand, that which responds to a speculative conception of man, and present. therefore, if at all possible, the opportune anthoropological justification about the way in which human violence is conceived and evaluated.