ABSTRACT
Aggressive behaviour has in fact been studied by a number of psychologists from many different backgrounds including the clinical, observational and experimental. Of particular interest here have been the study of ways in which the individual's interaction with the environment may produce violence; attention has also been directed to the identification of psychological characteristics of violent people. Clinically the occurrence of aggressive behaviour has been observed following the withdrawal of the normally rewarding consequences of behaviour, a process which has also been demonstrated experimentally. The process of reactive aggression, then, provides the beginning of a framework within which to consider psychological aspects of violence. The application of personality assessment to problems of violence in particular has however raised some interesting and promising possibilities. In one of the most well thought out perspectives Megargee distinguished two possible sources of violent behaviour within the individual from quite different personality types.
