Effects of anger on dominance-seeking and aggressive behaviors

Abstract

Anger may have evolved to orchestrate social bargaining behaviors, which ultimately can lead to establishment of dominance hierarchies. Although the relationship between anger and dominance has strong empirical support, most studies have focused on visual cues of dominance. Across two experiments, we tested the hypothesis that anger increases dominance-seeking and agonistic behaviors in those who feel it. In the first experiment (n = 82), we induced anger through a hostile mock debate and measured corrugator electromyographic activity, testosterone and cortisol levels, status-seeking tendency, and aggression using behavioral tasks. Compared with the control group, the anger group showed higher levels of aggression and status seeking, with the moderator effect of anger intensity. In the second experiment (n = 162), anger, fear, sadness, and neutral state were induced by film clips, after which dominance-related behavioral tendencies were assessed. The anger group showed higher dominance scores, differing significantly from the fear, sadness, and/or control groups. These findings reinforce the notion that feelings of anger can cause an increase in status-seeking and agonistic behaviors, leading to possible action tendencies for the establishment of dominance hierarchies.

Introduction

Emotions have important biological functions and their expressions are adaptations that are critical to the survival of some animals (Darwin, 1872; Shariff & Tracy, 2011; Tooby & Cosmides, 2008). Unlike moods, emotional responses predispose the individual to action, producing a cascade of rapid physiological changes and preparing behavioral reaction tendencies, which affect social interactions and nonverbal communication (Ekman & Cordaro, 2011; Izard, 2007; Moors, Ellsworth, Scherer, & Frijda, 2013; Scherer, 2005). Anger is usually a short-lived and intense negative emotion that can be triggered by the frustration of personal goals (Carver & Harmon-Jones, 2009; Ekman & Cordaro, 2011; Frijda, 1986). Although the importance of anger expression for social interactions is well established, the functional and adaptive role of anger on human behavior have only recently begun to be elucidated (e.g., Sell, Cosmides, & Tooby, 2014; Sell, Tooby, & Cosmides, 2009).

Anger is characterized by several behavioral and physiological changes (Cabral, Tavares, & de Almeida, 2016). The main behavioral manifestations of anger are linked to hostility, impulsivity, and aggression (Archer & Webb, 2006; Veenstra, Bushman, & Koole, 2017). Although anger has a negative valence (i.e., is elicited by stimuli perceived as unpleasant), it triggers approach responses to the eliciting stimulus (Carver & Harmon-Jones, 2009; Harmon-Jones & Sigelman, 2001). This emotion correlates with strength (Sell et al., 2009; Sell, Hone, & Pound, 2012; Tibubos, Schnell, & Rohrmann, 2013), sense of control (Lerner & Keltner, 2001), assertiveness (Doyle & Biaggio, 1981), and competitiveness (Adam & Brett, 2015; Archer & Webb, 2006). Physiologically, anger at more intense levels has an effect on the secretion of testosterone (Peterson & Harmon-Jones, 2012; Stanton, Wirth, Waugh, & Schultheiss, 2009). In everyday life, people experience some of the most important consequences of anger in social situations (Deffenbacher, Oetting, Lynch, & Morris, 1996). These effects have been increasingly studied in the context of negotiations, where expression of anger is relatively common (Fabiansson & Denson, 2012). In negotiations, people concede more when they realize that their opponents are feeling angry (Overbeck, Neale, & Govan, 2010; Sinaceur & Tiedens, 2006; van Kleef, De Dreu, & Manstead, 2004). This may be an effect of fear, since anger can induce a complementary response of fear, which can be instilled in the angry person's opponent (Dimberg & Öhman, 1996; van Kleef et al., 2004).

Several studies have found evidence that anger has an effect on dominance, which is an agonistic pattern highly adaptive for many species (Archer, 2009; Holekamp & Strauss, 2016). Individuals expressing anger are perceived as more dominant than those expressing other emotions or in neutral situations (Hareli, Shomrat, & Hess, 2009; Hess, Blairy, & Kleck, 2000; Knutson, 1996). Facial expressions of anger, with the eyebrow frown being its main feature, can be interpreted as threat signals (Hermans, Ramsey, & van Honk, 2008; Öhman, Lundqvist, & Esteves, 2001; Reed, DeScioli, & Pinker, 2014), and such signals play a key role in establishment and maintenance of social hierarchies (Buss, 2008; van Honk, Bos, & Terburg, 2014). In turn, there is a perception that high-status individuals have a greater propensity to feel angry, when compared with lower-ranked individuals (Hess, Adams, & Kleck, 2005; Tiedens, Ellsworth, & Mesquita, 2000). Indeed, mutual effects between anger and dominance have a solid empirical basis; however, most of these studies have focused on the effects of visual cues of facial and body expressions (Cabral et al., 2016), overlooking other possible effects between these variables.

Dominance can be defined as a pattern of social interaction based on control of both the behavior of lower-ranked individuals and valuable resources, and arises as a consequence of asymmetric agonistic encounters (Drews, 1993; Kaufmann, 1983). Dominance is established through fighting ability (i.e., resource holding potential; Parker, 1974), status signals (Maynard Smith & Harper, 1988), or other extrinsic factors (Dugatkin & Dugatkin, 2007; Huntingford & Turner, 1987; van Doorn, Hengeveld, & Weissing, 2003). In primates, dominance seeking is an adaptive behavior that can facilitate reproductive efforts and allow privileged access to available resources (Cowlishaw & Dunbar, 1991; Holekamp & Strauss, 2016; Kaufmann, 1983). Hierarchies regulate access to food, territory, and mates, reducing energy expenditure and injuries resulting from aggressive contests (Holekamp & Strauss, 2016; Kaufmann, 1983).

Several characteristics of anger are equally typical of dominance-seeking behaviors. In humans, dominance can increase assertiveness (Williams & Tiedens, 2015), competitiveness (Mehta, Jones, & Josephs, 2008) and testosterone secretion (Mazur & Booth, 1998; Mehta et al., 2008). Like angry individuals, dominant individuals are more prone to aggression (Johnson, Burk, & Kirkpatrick, 2007), which in turn is another naturally decisive factor in the establishment of dominance hierarchies (Archer, 2009; Holekamp & Strauss, 2016). In addition, dominant behavior also has a complementary effect, leading some observers to follow submissive behavioral patterns (Tiedens & Fragale, 2003), besides having a significant role in negotiations (Anderson & Galinsky, 2006).

These similar patterns for anger and dominance seeking may indicate overlapping adaptive functions between both variables. As for dominance, humans were exposed to similar selective pressures as those that determined intraspecific hostile interactions in other social animals (Archer, 2009; de Almeida, Cabral, & Narvaes, 2015; Huntingford & Turner, 1987; Sell et al., 2012). In fact, it is not logical to assume that such adaptation, which is highly relevant for the fitness and behavior of a wide variety of taxonomic groups, has not significantly impacted the way humans respond to their environments. However, the influence of dominance on human behavior is still underestimated. Perhaps dominance displays (for nonhuman animals) are a natural expression of what we call “anger expressions” for humans.

This possible overlap may be explained by the recalibrational theory of anger that was proposed and empirically corroborated by Sell et al., 2009, Sell et al., 2014. According to Sell (2011), anger is an adaptation to resolve conflicts using a bargaining system that motivates the infliction of costs on opponents in an attempt to have opponents place greater weight on the welfare of the angry individual. That is, anger evolved to orchestrate social bargaining behaviors, resolving conflicts in favor of angry people. However, such conflict resolution mechanisms can be determinant of the establishment and maintenance of dominance hierarchies. Indeed, the recalibrational theory of anger is based on the evolutionary concept of resource-holding potential (Sell, 2006, Sell, 2011), which is a key factor in understanding the agonistic and dominant behaviors – including escalation and asymmetric conflicts – in many animal species (Dugatkin & Dugatkin, 2007; Maynard Smith & Parker, 1976; Parker, 1974). Resource-holding potential is the measure of the fighting ability of a given animal, i.e., its inherent ability to acquire and hold a resource in contests (Maynard Smith & Parker, 1976; Parker, 1974). Differences in resource-holding potential (asymmetries) can lead to dominant-subordinate status (Buss, 2008; Dugatkin & Dugatkin, 2007; Huntingford & Turner, 1987; Maynard Smith & Parker, 1976; Parker, 1974). In this way, anger can help to maintain or improve one's standing in a dominance hierarchy. However, as far as we know, no study has investigated whether anger triggers dominance-seeking behaviors in those who feel it.

Across two experiments, we investigate whether anger induction causes agonistic, dominance-seeking tendencies in men. In Study 1, we manipulated a male-male social interaction to induce anger, testing the following predictions: 1) anger increases status-seeking tendencies; 2) anger increases aggressive behavior; and, 3) steroid hormone responses moderate the effects of anger on status-seeking tendencies. In Study 2, we used film clips to induce anger, other negative emotions (fear and sadness) and a neutral state (control). We predicted that anger increases self-reported typical dominance behaviors (e.g., approach-retreat patterns, leadership motivation, and eye contact).