Reactive and Proactive Aggression in Portugal: A Biosocial Approach

• In Event: The Intersection of Race, Ethnicity, and Sex: A Biopsychosocial Approach

Abstract

This investigation, part of a criminology doctoral program at the University of Porto's Faculty of Law, funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), examines reactive and proactive aggression.
The study aims to understand their underlying factors, drawing on Biosocial Criminology. It analyzes social, environmental, and biopsychosocial determinants in explicating aggression typologies proposed by Dodge & Coie (1987), with an anticipated sample size of 400 individuals in Portugal.
To achieve this goal, a comprehensive self-report questionnaire has been meticulously crafted by amalgamating validated instruments pertinent to the study's constructs. Additionally, designed laboratory tasks have been devised to assess reactive and proactive aggression (e.g., R/PTAP - Boccadoro et al., 2021), sensation seeking (e.g., BART - Lejuez et al., 2002), and fearlessness (e.g., The novel bell conditioning task - Shechner et al., 2015).
Furthermore, psychophysiological factors will be assessed in a subset of the sample using specialized equipment from the BIOPAC System at a later stage of data collection.
The forthcoming oral presentation will predominantly focus on the preliminary findings derived from the pre-tests conducted as part of this investigation, ensuring the measurement tools' psychometric robustness across the entire sample, thereby facilitating an initial exploration of the accrued data.

Authors

• leonor Pina Freitas, School of Criminology, Faculty of Law, University of Porto

• Carla Sofia Cardoso, CIJ - Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Justice / School of Criminology, Faculty of Law, University of Porto

• Margarida A. Santos, CIJ - Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Justice / School of Criminology, Faculty of Law, University of Porto