Lots written about this - and, of course, a range of diverse opinions exist. As a starting point, key authors/works that spring to mind (and are reasonably accessible) include Jeff Hearn's 'The Violences of Men' (Sage, 1998); Fawcett, Featherstone, Hearn & Toft's 'Violence and gender relations: Theories and interventions' (Sage, 1996); Alan Grieg (for eg, see: http://www.health.columbia.edu/pdfs/men_gender_violence.pdf); RW Connell; Elizabeth Stanko's (as editor) 'The meanings of violence' (Routledge, 2003); and many more ... You might also like to have a look at some of my own research in this area - for example: '"Real" violence: Gender and (male) violence - an Australian perspective' (2009, Probation Journal, 56(1), 29-44); and '(Re)Gendering violence: Men, masculinities and violence' (In The Australian and New Zealand Critical Criminology Conference Proceedings 2010 - edited by Mason, Milivojevic & Lee, Institute of Criminology, University of Sydney).

There has also been some really interesting work done in relation to aggression & violence (including bullying) in the educational/school setting - see, for example, Ringrose & Renold (2009), Morrell (2002), Mills (2001), Mills & Keddie (2010), etc.

Good luck!

I think it is often model learning by parents and peers like described by Bandura.

Violence comes from ignorance

I think this is a difficult question. First of all, what constitutes aggression? Is it physical force, or verbal intimidation, or is it manipulation of the people and environment around you, or some combination? As a teenager I witnessed boys and girls who were more than capable of providing all of these displays of aggression and yet as an adult this is much less apparent, leading to a conclusion that what is acceptable or allowed behaviour, independent of gender, is more a predictor. Ultimately aggression is simply a form of power and control, and if one form doesn't work, then another might. Sustained psychological abuse can be very damaging to the individual and I believe can be seen as a form of aggression, equally possible from a male or female perspective. There may be a relationship between preferred types of aggression and gender, but I'm not sure there is one between gender and aggression specifically.

Lots written about this - and, of course, a range of diverse opinions exist. As a starting point, key authors/works that spring to mind (and are reasonably accessible) include Jeff Hearn's 'The Violences of Men' (Sage, 1998); Fawcett, Featherstone, Hearn & Toft's 'Violence and gender relations: Theories and interventions' (Sage, 1996); Alan Grieg (for eg, see: http://www.health.columbia.edu/pdfs/men_gender_violence.pdf); RW Connell; Elizabeth Stanko's (as editor) 'The meanings of violence' (Routledge, 2003); and many more ... You might also like to have a look at some of my own research in this area - for example: '"Real" violence: Gender and (male) violence - an Australian perspective' (2009, Probation Journal, 56(1), 29-44); and '(Re)Gendering violence: Men, masculinities and violence' (In The Australian and New Zealand Critical Criminology Conference Proceedings 2010 - edited by Mason, Milivojevic & Lee, Institute of Criminology, University of Sydney).

There has also been some really interesting work done in relation to aggression & violence (including bullying) in the educational/school setting - see, for example, Ringrose & Renold (2009), Morrell (2002), Mills (2001), Mills & Keddie (2010), etc.

Good luck!

Hello Sharan,

Indeed your question is complex and controversial. I will try to answer your question about the relationship and aggression within the family or couple (as this is my area of expertise). This may not apply to aggression in other contexts (bullying, sex offenders, etc.).

According to the most extensive and updated reviews on partner violence in developed English nations such as the US, Canada, the UK, etc (Capaldi, Knoble, Shortt, Kim, 2012) there is a wide array of factors (e.g. family risk factors, peer associations and influences, psychological and behavioural risk factors, cognition, relational influences and interactional patterns, etc.) that are related to partner violence (or domestic violence. Domestic violence in non-clinical samples is in general perpetrated primarily by women (men also perpetrate). In clinical samples men and women use different forms of aggression in roughly the same rates when important variables (e.g. family-of-origin characteristics, parenting, child behavior problems, adolescent psychiatric disorders and personality traits) are controlled.

In a review conducted revising studies in non-English speaking natios and less develloped nations (Esquivel-Santoveña, Lambert, Hamel, 2013) is a risk factor for domestic violence. In some societies women were primarily victimised whilst men were primarily victimised by women.

In short, gender and aggression in the family or in couples do not always have a causal relationship(in terms of prevalence), in most cases gender does not determine or cause DV because of power and control differentials as it is widely believed. Like I said this applies to what we know as domestic violence, family violence or intimate partner violence. Gender is A risk factor of DV or IPV.

Maybe other researchers involved in the study of bullying, stranger aggression, sexual offenders can shed some light about gender and aggression in those contexts.

Hope this helps

The answer to this one will also vary by cultural context. One cultural setting or ethnicity may consider different aggression levels between genders to be natural, and even foster them in children, while another may not.

Both Esteban and Naomi respectively have excellent points here on the topic of aggression and it's roots ; however, I'd also like to add that for much of the research on VAW specifically, it lends itself to more DV root causes to be a combination of Bio-Psycho-Social contributions to a systemic delivery of aggression not necessarily gender specific. Thus providing researchers on this subject with much to do in regards to risk assessment strategies that are gender neutral in content and can be applied across the lifespan. Any thoughts here?

Aggression of the gender depend on the situation. If you mean purely the relation of gender and aggression then you need to explain what time of gender and geographical location. Because the aggression of gender is different in different cultural which base on various situation.

As others have pointed out, this is a complex questions. However, here's an article that might prove informative, at least in some countries:

Gender differences in aggression as a function of provocation: A meta-analysis.

Bettencourt, B. Ann; Miller, Norman

Psychological Bulletin, Vol 119(3), May 1996, 422-447. doi: 10.1037/0033-2909.119.3.422

There is no relationship between gender and aggression but it can be a relationship between the nature of the circumstances they are dealing with which become the reason to aggression. It can be the case with any gender

I think gender has nothing to do with aggression, it all about our percpetions that how we see the outer world.

I disagree with the view that there is no relationship between gender and aggression. The issue is that it depends on the situation. In general, it appears that males tend to be more aggressive than females in the absence of a provocation (see the meta-analysis I posted above). Under conditions of a provocation, however, the difference tends to decrease. That's for general aggression. What about violence? If you look at statistics of violent crimes, men are more likely to commit them than women. The answer to the question is more complex than most imagine. Both genders are capable of aggression and violence under certain circumstances, but men are generally more aggressive as far as I can see, from both anecdotal and empirical evidence.

Hi,

It is very common to merge male gender with aggression and domestic violence. And there is long tradition too, to assign men as perpetrator and women as victim. As causes of this bias often biology and evolution reason are used. How far this assignment maybe produces like a self full filling prophecy gender specific aggressive or not-aggressive behavior is not complete answered yet but seems to be plausible.

How much man and women are involved in domestic/ partner violence is a highly controversial debate.

So far as I know most studies confirm that men and women are more or less similar involved in domestic violence both as perpetrators and as victims.

This thesis comes from a popular meta study from Murray Straus updated in 2006/2007

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740907001855

(I try to ad) see below

Another source from 2012 who confirm the thesis is a bibliography study of Martin Fiebert

http://csulb.edu/~mfiebert/assault.htm

Hope that is helpful

Have a nice day

Volker