Cultural–Societal Roots of Violence: Youth Violence

Ervin Staub

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511615795.014

13 - Cultural–Societal Roots of Violence: Youth Violence

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 May 2010

Ervin Staub

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Ervin Staub: Affiliation:
University of Massachusetts, Amherst

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Summary

cultural–societal sources of the socialization and experiences that lead to aggression

Difficult Life Conditions

To understand the increase in aggression by youth, we must specify not only cultural–societal influences, but also changes in those influences. In my view, there have been moderately difficult life conditions in the United States in the past quarter of a century, created primarily by tremendous cultural–societal change. Great, rapid social change, even of a positive kind, creates psychological dislocation and frustrates basic needs in people, which affects their treatment of children.

The following have been some of the elements of difficult life conditions in the United States. Starting in the 1960s, a number of important leaders were assassinated. The United States fought a major war that created a great schism within the country. The United States lost economic power and prestige. The civil rights movement and feminism brought major changes to social arrangements and individual lives. There have been changes in gender relations and sexual mores, an increase of women in the workforce, and great increases in divorce rates and in single parenting. The drug culture (both taking and selling drugs) has affected many people's lives. Some of these changes, and the loss of clear guiding values associated with them, have had direct effects on family life, parenting, and the experiences of children, effects that are the proximal causes of youth violence.

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Type: Chapter
Information: The Psychology of Good and Evil
Why Children, Adults, and Groups Help and Harm Others
, pp. 212 - 223

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511615795.014 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2003

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