ABSTRACT
This chapter is concerned with aggressive behavior that is motivated by anger. This type of aggression is known as affective, impulsive, hostile, or reactive aggression. It reviews the empirical literature on motivation to control anger-driven aggression and the neuroscience underpinning anger control. Baumeister and colleague's influential strength model of self-control provided the theoretical basis for experimental work on self-control and aggression. A series of studies investigated the notion that low levels of glucose may be responsible for heightened aggression. One of the earliest investigations into the possibility that violent individuals are motivated to control anger-driven aggression comes from the literature on overcontrolled hostility. The strength model specifies two means of augmenting self-control capacity. The first is by practicing self-control over an extended period of time. This practice is referred to as self-control training (SCT). Healthy people relatively high in reactive aggressiveness have inefficient brain responses to anger provocation.
