Department of Psychology, Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
Aggress Behav. 2013 Nov-Dec;39(6):472-81. doi: 10.1002/ab.21491. Epub 2013 Jun 6.
Research in the aggression domain has been mixed regarding the effectiveness of using mitigating information (e.g., excuses, apologies) to reduce aggressive behavior after a provocation. Aggression theory (e.g., general aggression model) posits that mitigating information may cues re-appraisal processes to potentially change aggressive behavior. If re-appraisal processes are engaged, aggressive behavior is likely to decrease. Currently, no published study has synthesized the literature to test such theoretical claims. The current study used meta-analysis to test this effect and examine the influence of several possible moderators. Results showed a significant negative effect size, suggesting that mitigating information does indeed reduce aggressive behavior after a provocation. However, these results were qualified by several significant moderators. Results showed that mitigating information reduces aggression when (a) the information did not come from an apology, (b) the non-apologetic mitigating information was high quality, and c) the provocation was mild (vs. strong). Theoretical extensions are discussed.
关于在挑衅后使用缓解信息（例如借口、道歉）来减少攻击行为的效果，攻击领域的研究结果喜忧参半。攻击理论（例如一般攻击模型）假设，缓解信息可能会提示重新评估过程，从而有可能改变攻击行为。如果重新评估过程被激活，攻击行为可能会减少。目前，尚无已发表的研究综合文献来检验这些理论主张。本研究使用元分析来检验这种效应，并检查几个可能的调节变量的影响。结果表明存在显著的负效应大小，表明缓解信息确实可以减少挑衅后的攻击行为。然而，这些结果受到几个显著调节变量的限制。结果表明，当缓解信息(a) 不是来自道歉，(b) 是非道歉性的高质量缓解信息，和(c) 挑衅是轻微的（相比强烈的）时，缓解信息会减少攻击。讨论了理论延伸。
