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Payback: Why We Retaliate, Redirect Aggression, and Take Revenge
From the child taunted by her playmates to the office worker who feels stifled in his daily routine, people frequently take out their pain and anger on others, even those who had nothing to do with the original stress. The bullied child may kick her puppy, the stifled worker yells at his Payback can be directed anywhere, sometimes at inanimate things, animals, or other people. In Payback , the husband-and wife team of evolutionary biologist David Barash and psychiatrist Judith Lipton offer an illuminating look at this phenomenon, showing how it has evolved, why it occurs, and what we can do about it.
Retaliation and revenge are well known to most people. We all know what it is like to want to get even, get justice, or take revenge. What is new in this book is an extended discussion of redirected aggression, which occurs not only in people but other species as well. The authors reveal that it's not just a matter of yelling at your spouse "because" your boss yells at you. Indeed, the phenomenon of redirected aggression--so-called to differentiate it from retaliation and revenge, the other main forms of payback--haunts our criminal courts, our streets, our battlefields, our homes, and our hearts. It lurks behind some of the nastiest and seemingly inexplicable things that otherwise decent people do, from road rage to yelling at a crying baby. And it exists across boundaries of every kind--culture, time, geography, and even species. Indeed, it's not just a human phenomenon. Passing pain to others can be seen in birds and horses, fish and primates--in virtually all vertebrates.
It turns out that there is robust neurobiological hardware and software promoting redirected aggression, as well as evolutionary underpinnings.
Payback may be natural, the authors conclude, but we are capable of rising above it, without sacrificing self-esteem and social status. They show how the various human responses to pain and suffering can be managed--mindfully, carefully, and humanely.
Retaliation and revenge are well known to most people. We all know what it is like to want to get even, get justice, or take revenge. What is new in this book is an extended discussion of redirected aggression, which occurs not only in people but other species as well. The authors reveal that it's not just a matter of yelling at your spouse "because" your boss yells at you. Indeed, the phenomenon of redirected aggression--so-called to differentiate it from retaliation and revenge, the other main forms of payback--haunts our criminal courts, our streets, our battlefields, our homes, and our hearts. It lurks behind some of the nastiest and seemingly inexplicable things that otherwise decent people do, from road rage to yelling at a crying baby. And it exists across boundaries of every kind--culture, time, geography, and even species. Indeed, it's not just a human phenomenon. Passing pain to others can be seen in birds and horses, fish and primates--in virtually all vertebrates.
It turns out that there is robust neurobiological hardware and software promoting redirected aggression, as well as evolutionary underpinnings.
Payback may be natural, the authors conclude, but we are capable of rising above it, without sacrificing self-esteem and social status. They show how the various human responses to pain and suffering can be managed--mindfully, carefully, and humanely.
209 pages, Hardcover
First published March 28, 2011
4 people are currently reading
81 people want to read
About the author
David Philip Barash
45 books65 followersDavid P. Barash is a Professor of Psychology at the University of Washington, and is notable for books on Human aggression, Peace Studies, and the sexual behavior of animals and people. He has written approximately 30 books in total. He received his bachelor's degree in biology from Harpur College, Binghamton University, and a Ph.D. in zoology from University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1970. He taught at the State University of New York at Oneonta, and then accepted a permanent position at the University of Washington.
His book Natural Selections: selfish altruists, honest liars and other realities of evolution is based on articles in the Chronicle of Higher Education and published in 2007 by Bellevue Literary Press. Immediately before that was Madame Bovary's Ovaries: a Darwinian look at literature, a popular but serious presentation of Darwinian literary criticism, jointly written with his daughter, Nanelle Rose Barash. He has also written over 230 scholarly articles and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, along with many other honors.
In 2008, a second edition of the textbook Peace and Conflict Studies co-authored with Charles P. Webel was published by Sage. In 2009, Columbia University Press published How Women Got Their Curves and Other Just-So Stories, a book on sex differentiation co-authored with Judith Eve Lipton. This was followed in 2010 by Strange Bedfellows: the surprising connection between sex, evolution and monogamy published by Bellevue Literary Press, and, in 2011, Payback: why we retaliate, redirect aggression and seek revenge, coauthored with Judith Eve Lipton and published by Oxford University Press. His book Homo Mysterious: Evolutionary puzzles of human nature appeared in 2012, also published by Oxford University Press, and in 2013, Sage published the 3rd edition of his text, Peace and Conflict Studies.
His book Natural Selections: selfish altruists, honest liars and other realities of evolution is based on articles in the Chronicle of Higher Education and published in 2007 by Bellevue Literary Press. Immediately before that was Madame Bovary's Ovaries: a Darwinian look at literature, a popular but serious presentation of Darwinian literary criticism, jointly written with his daughter, Nanelle Rose Barash. He has also written over 230 scholarly articles and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, along with many other honors.
In 2008, a second edition of the textbook Peace and Conflict Studies co-authored with Charles P. Webel was published by Sage. In 2009, Columbia University Press published How Women Got Their Curves and Other Just-So Stories, a book on sex differentiation co-authored with Judith Eve Lipton. This was followed in 2010 by Strange Bedfellows: the surprising connection between sex, evolution and monogamy published by Bellevue Literary Press, and, in 2011, Payback: why we retaliate, redirect aggression and seek revenge, coauthored with Judith Eve Lipton and published by Oxford University Press. His book Homo Mysterious: Evolutionary puzzles of human nature appeared in 2012, also published by Oxford University Press, and in 2013, Sage published the 3rd edition of his text, Peace and Conflict Studies.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
November 19, 2012
Basically, though neither of the husband-and-wife team of authors uses the phrase, this book is a backgrounder evolutionary psychology done right, with a full course of social psychology, on why people usally act back ... in one of three ways ... when attacked either physically or verbally/emotionally.
The "ev psych done right"? Briefly, the authors note that many animals either retaliate against aggression or else redirect it lower down the food chain while we (and chimpanzees) are the only ones so far known to also use revenge. From there, they look at how this affects/relieves stress, in both humans and other animals.
Then it's on to the human social psychology. They ask how this affects ideas of "justice" and more. The chapter on justice, with its looks at retributive and rehabilitative aspects of justice in light of humans' built-in payback propensities, could become a book by itself were the authors of a mind to do so.
Both in humans and animals, besides stress issues, the authors note aggression, and the various ways of dealing with it, relate closely to social status issues. they suggest this is part of why simple apologies often don't satisfy victims. Rather, whether consciously or not, victims are looking for a restoration of lost status, and perhaps a diminution of the aggressor's status. That doesn't happen after a few words.
Finally, the authors look at various religious traditions, as well as modern psychology, to suggest some ideas for forgiveness, for development of better non-retaliation skills and more.
Finally, don't just take my word for it. Any book with good blurbs by Robert Sapolsky and Frans de Wall ... another "Recommend" right there. So dive in!
The "ev psych done right"? Briefly, the authors note that many animals either retaliate against aggression or else redirect it lower down the food chain while we (and chimpanzees) are the only ones so far known to also use revenge. From there, they look at how this affects/relieves stress, in both humans and other animals.
Then it's on to the human social psychology. They ask how this affects ideas of "justice" and more. The chapter on justice, with its looks at retributive and rehabilitative aspects of justice in light of humans' built-in payback propensities, could become a book by itself were the authors of a mind to do so.
Both in humans and animals, besides stress issues, the authors note aggression, and the various ways of dealing with it, relate closely to social status issues. they suggest this is part of why simple apologies often don't satisfy victims. Rather, whether consciously or not, victims are looking for a restoration of lost status, and perhaps a diminution of the aggressor's status. That doesn't happen after a few words.
Finally, the authors look at various religious traditions, as well as modern psychology, to suggest some ideas for forgiveness, for development of better non-retaliation skills and more.
Finally, don't just take my word for it. Any book with good blurbs by Robert Sapolsky and Frans de Wall ... another "Recommend" right there. So dive in!
November 19, 2015
Another important contribution to violence studies, this time focusing on the origins of revenge, retaliation, and redirected aggression. Barash also takes a social-psycho-cultural approach, as well as exploring the neuroscience behind some of our common behaviors. The conclusion reached is that these kinds of violent behaviors are principally caused to take pain away from the self by redirecting it onto others. That is, when we are hurt, we alleviate our own pain by being aggressive or violent with another person, essentially scapegoating them. When our boss, for example, yells at us, we get road rage on the way home or yell at our wife or husband or kids, and they go and put their pain on others. Aggression, then, spreads like a virus throughout social and community systems. Fascinating reading.
January 31, 2014
A very insightful read. I hadn't reflected deeply on how ubiquitous redirected aggression is (even in nonhuman animals) or had any understanding of its causes.
As with all of Barash's books, I have two problems: 1) He repeats himself a lot (across books) so even if you love the first thing of his you've read, you may be disappointed that on the second, you've already read half of it. 2) Although he identifies "problems" with humanity (our tendencies to be aggressive, unfaithful, generally selfish hypocrites) and even offers some short-term fixes for how to "play nice", he never really addresses the deeper issue that the evolutionary process necessarily produces creatures that put their self-interest first, and whether it is possible or desirable to work counter to that prime directive. But that's a very deep question, one that I hope to ask Barash himself one day.
As with all of Barash's books, I have two problems: 1) He repeats himself a lot (across books) so even if you love the first thing of his you've read, you may be disappointed that on the second, you've already read half of it. 2) Although he identifies "problems" with humanity (our tendencies to be aggressive, unfaithful, generally selfish hypocrites) and even offers some short-term fixes for how to "play nice", he never really addresses the deeper issue that the evolutionary process necessarily produces creatures that put their self-interest first, and whether it is possible or desirable to work counter to that prime directive. But that's a very deep question, one that I hope to ask Barash himself one day.
October 6, 2014
An interesting discussion, written by a biologist and psychiatrist couple, of why humans hurt each other. I got a lot out of the early chapters about biological and evolutionary drives that cause us to lash out at other people when we ourselves are hurt. But the later discussions that projected from the interpersonal to inter-group and international didn't really hold my attention as well. There were some interesting discussions at the end on techniques for avoiding payback according to different religious, psychological and philosophical traditions, but they didn't go into much detail. More of introduction to the topic than a guide to better behavior. I did get a lot out of the good literary examples.
August 7, 2011
Why does everyone at one time or another seem to need another person to blame? Why do
we take our anger out on someone who isn't even the cause of our irritation or pain?
Ever wonder if people are just prone to nastiness and vengeful deeds?
This book will answer a lot of your questions about why we do what we do
and maybe how to stop some of it. My beef with the book is that I felt it could
have been done just as well in half the pages. There's an entire chapter that
deals with the titled behaviors as treated in world literature.
we take our anger out on someone who isn't even the cause of our irritation or pain?
Ever wonder if people are just prone to nastiness and vengeful deeds?
This book will answer a lot of your questions about why we do what we do
and maybe how to stop some of it. My beef with the book is that I felt it could
have been done just as well in half the pages. There's an entire chapter that
deals with the titled behaviors as treated in world literature.
November 13, 2012
Interesting analysis of why we retaliate against people we think harmed us.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews