title: Trait anger as a mediator of difficulties with emotion regulation and female-perpetrated psychological aggression.
abstract: Recent research has demonstrated the devastating impact of female-perpetrated psychological aggression in intimate relationships broadly and dating relationships specifically. With the perpetration of psychological aggression in dating relationships occurring at shockingly high rates, prevention programming for dating violence should target this form of aggression. Toward this end, it is important to understand the antecedent conditions that increase one's risk for perpetrating psychological aggression. This study sought to examine two possible risk factors for perpetrating psychological aggression among female undergraduates (N = 145), namely, emotion regulation and trait anger. Findings showed that difficulties with emotion regulation and trait anger were associated with increased psychological aggression perpetration, and trait anger mediated the link between emotion regulation and psychological aggression. Implications of these findings for prevention programming and future research are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville 37996, USA. rshorey@utk.edu
authors.forename: Ryan C
authors.initials: RC
authors.lastname: Shorey
authors.forename: Tara L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Cornelius
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Idema
mesh_terms: D000374:Aggression / Q000523:psychology*; D003380:Courtship; D019548:Crime Victims / Q000523:psychology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D012307:Risk Factors; D012649:Self Concept; D013179:Spouse Abuse / Q000523:psychology*; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014481:United States; D055815:Young Adult