Predatory Or Affective Aggression An Analysis Of Andrea...

Predatory or Affective Aggression: An Analysis of Andrea Yates The case of Andrea Yates shows that many factors may contribute to the commission of a crime. These range from psychological and biological factors such as mental disorders, cognitions, and neurological conditions to the sociological influences on a person’s life. Two psycho-biologically distinctive modes of aggression, affective and predatory, have received substantial experimental and clinical attention during the past 30 years. Affective aggression in humans is a defensive mode of violence that is accompanied by high levels of sympathetic arousal and emotion, usually anger and fear, and is a time-limited reaction to an imminent threat. Predatory aggression in humans is an attack mode of violence that is accompanied by minimal automatic arousal, and is planned, purposeful, and emotionless. The case of Andrea Yates shows that many factors may contribute to the commission of a crime. These range from psychological and biological factors such as mental disorders, cognitions, and neurological conditions to the sociological influences on a person’s life. Yates’s crime was unusual, the result of a perfect storm of mental, medical, and sociological stresses. But her case nonetheless illustrates that the extraordinarily complex nature of human behavior continually challenges the efforts of criminal justice experts to understand the causes of crime. Much research has been devoted to understanding why people commit