Aggression and false memories

Abstract

Previous research focusing on individual differences in aggression has used ambiguous stimuli. Study one created a wordlist that was ambiguous around both kitchen and violent themes to be used in study two. Study two used an adapted Deese, Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm to identify differences between high and low, primed and non-primed aggressive people. A DRM memory task was carried out with 100 psychology students, 50 were high aggressive, 50 low aggressive and equal numbers in each group either primed or non-primed. Results showed that participants high in trait aggression who were primed made significantly more violent intrusions on, and violent interpretations of, the ambiguous list than any other group. Possible explanations for these results are discussed along with further research ideas.