Relational Aggressiveness in Adolescence: Relations With Emotional Awareness and Self-Control

Abstract

Involvement in relationally aggressive conduct is an important contributor to maladaptive functioning in both childhood and adulthood. Decreased emotional awareness and impairments of self-control are risk factors for relational aggressiveness, while emotional awareness can also be treated as an important prerequisite for proper self-control. The aim of the study was to examine the associations between dimensions of emotional awareness (attention to emotions and emotional clarity), self-control, and relational aggressiveness. Self-control was also examined as a mediating variable between emotional awareness and relational aggressiveness. Self-report measures of trait meta-mood, alexithymia, self-control, and relational aggressiveness were completed by 214 adolescents (129 females), aged 15–23. The confirmatory factor analysis confirmed two factors of emotional awareness: (1) inattention to emotions (reflecting low attention to emotions and externally oriented thinking) and (2) a lack of emotional clarity (reflecting difficulties in identifying emotion, difficulties in describing emotion, and low clarity of emotion). Self-control and mood repair ability inversely correlated with proactive and reactive relational aggressiveness, whereas the clarity component of the meta-mood trait only inversely predicted reactive relational aggressiveness. Structural equation modeling (SEM) showed that direct relationships between inattention to emotions and relational aggressiveness, as well as between lack of emotional clarity and relational aggressiveness were non-significant. Nevertheless, a lack of emotional clarity was indirectly and significantly associated with relational aggressiveness through decreased self-control.

Clarifying the Relationship Between Aggression and Self-Control Using Random Item Slope Regression

“…Beyond simple correlations, these measures are commonly included in studies utilizing behavioral measures of these constructs and in measure development studies to examine construct validity (e.g., Chester & Lasko, 2019). Further, trait aggression and trait self-control are commonly included in more complex statistical models (e.g., structural equation models, cross-lagged models, indirect effect models) wherein the ultimate conclusions drawn from these models depends in part on the associations between trait aggression and trait self-control (e.g., Jeong et al, 2020;Sheppard et al, 2015;Chen et al, 2019;Moroń et al, 2018). Despite the evidence favoring the validity and reliability of these measures, one common feature that may impact the associations between them in the literature is the reliance on aggregated fixed-effect estimates.…”

Mediación de conflictos, competencia no difundida en médicos en formación: revisión

“…La razón neurofisiológica (42)(43)(44) del porqué de esta respuesta del cerebro emocional (sistema límbico) se encuentra en la velocidad de conducción nerviosa que se tiene en las conexiones en la interpretación de amenaza en el mundo exterior. En otras palabras, las conexiones del sistema límbico y los órganos de percepción de amenaza son mucho más rápidas y tardan en trasmitirse 125 milisegundos, mientras que la conexiones entre los sistemas sensoriales y la neocorteza tienen una conducción más lenta y tardan 450 milisegundos, es decir, es 3,6 veces más lento en comparación con la conexión de los órganos de los sentidos y el sistema emocional (45)(46)(47)(48) .…”