There is more to anger coping than "in" or "out".
There is growing dissatisfaction with a dichotomized "anger-in" versus "anger-out" view of anger coping. Three studies using student and community adultsamples revealed a broader understanding of the nature of anger coping styles and led to the development of the new Behavioral Anger Response Questionnaire (BARQ). The BARQ is empirically derived and factorially validated and has good psychometrics. Results suggest that dichotomizing anger responses as "in" versus "out" is too coarse and that a 6-factor model may be more appropriate. The 6 factors identified here are Direct Anger-Out, Assertion, Support-Seeking, Diffusion, Avoidance, and Rumination. Women reported use of a wider range of anger coping styles, especially more social support-seeking and more use of anger diffusion strategies than men.
Linden
Wolfgang
W
Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. wlinden@psych.ubc.ca
Hogan
Brenda E
BE
Rutledge
Thomas
T
Chawla
Anuradha
A
Lenz
Joseph W
JW
Leung
Debbie
D
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000786:Anger; D001242:Assertiveness; D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011594:Psychometrics; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology