A Comparative Research Of Aggressive Behaviors Between High Sadistic Personality And High Impulsive Personality

Sadism is defined that behavior about individuals who hurt others including physical,sexual or psychological.This behavior is not only aggressive,but also provides pleasant experience.Previous research have found that the traits of sadism are also correlated with various types of anti-social behaviors,such as school bullying,child abuse,sexual abuse,etc.,which can bring long-lasting harmful consequences to others' body and mind.This means that sadistic personality,similar to impulsive personality,which can trigger individual's aggression and harmful consequences.Researchers have explored the relationship between sadistic and impulsive traits and aggressive behaviors,and it was suggested that aggressive behaviors triggered by these two traits have different characteristics(Buckels et al.,2013;Reidy et al.,2011;Bushman et al.,2001;Babcock et al.,2014).However,it is rare to explore the relationship between sadistic traits and impulsive traits,and to compare the characteristics of aggressive behaviors between sadistic and impulsive traits.This research aims to investigate this issue by answering:(1)What is the relationship between sadistic personality and impulsive personality?(2)Is the high sadistic trait inclined to act with more proactive aggressive behaviors,while the high impulsive trait is more likely to arouse reactive aggressive behaviors?To examine the above questions,three studies were included.In specific,Study 1 used the “Varieties of Sadistic Tendencies(VAST)” and “Barratt Impulsiveness Scale(BIS-11)” to investigate the sadistic personality's structure and its relationship with the impulsive personality.Study 2 adopted the self-reporting method to examine how the sadistic personality and impulsive personality predicts reactive/proactive aggressive behaviors,with Reactive-Proactive Aggression Questionnaire(RPQ).Study 3 examined the causal relation between the sadistic personality and impulsive personality and reactive/active aggressive behavior in two laboratory experiments.In Experiment 1,a competitive reaction time task in the provoke situation was set to induce individual's reactive aggressive behavior;Experiment 2,at the basis of competitive reaction time task in the unprovoked situation,we modified it for measuring individual's proactive aggressive behavior.The main conclusions are as follows:(1)The sadistic trait distinct from the impulsive trait;(2)Individuals with high sadistic trait are more likely to implement proactive aggression;whereas,individuals with high impulsive trait are more likely to implement proactive aggression.The obtained conclusions do not only help people to understand the relationship between sadistic personality and impulsive personality,but also have important enlightening significance for understanding the formation mechanisms of proactive aggressive behaviors and reactive aggressive behaviors.In addition,these conclusions could provide a guideline for preventing and intervening anti-social behaviors of adolescents.