Abstract

The study of motivation and control typically focuses on personal motivation and self-perceptions of control. For example, how individuals react to and cope with their own achievement failure is an example of personal motivation. However, it also is useful to consider this topic in an interpersonal, rather than intrapersonal context, and to examine how perceptions of control in others influence social motivational outcomes, both prosocial (e.g., helping, friendship) and antisocial (e.g., aggression). Guided by this broader social motivational framework, I will discuss a series of studies that my colleagues and I have conducted on aggressive children's attributions of control and beliefs about others' responsibility for ambiguously caused provocation. Of particular importance is how such perceptions influence the aggressive child's propensity to engage in hostile retaliation. This research focuses on African American middle elementary and early adolescent boys of low socioeconomic status. Among the topics addressed in these studies are: (1) the cognitive (i.e., attributional) and socialization (maternal beliefs) antecedents of aggressive boys' beliefs about others' control; (2) their understanding of impression management strategies that individuals use to alter perceptions of responsibility and control; (3) and an intervention approach designed to change biased perceptions about others' responsibility for (control over) negative outcomes.

Introduction

The study of aggression is integrally related to perceived control and to the linked constructs of responsibility and intentionality. In this case, however, the focus is on perceived control in others rather than self-perceptions of control.