The Development of Aggression from Infancy to Adulthood

by L. Rowell Huesmann, Leonard D. Eron (Joint Author)

Despite many years of research on human aggressive behavior, much remains unknown. One thing, however, is very clear. Individual differences in the propensity to behave aggressively appear in early childhood and tend to remain throughout the life course.On the average, the more aggressive child becomes the more aggressive adult. Furthermore, more aggressive adults tend to beget more aggressive children establishing a continuity of aggressive behavior across generations. To understand aggressive behavior, a developmental approach is essential.

In this book, L. Rowell Huesmann and Leonard Eton examine the development of aggression from infancy to adulthood, from "birth baggage" to peer pressure among youth in the inner city to styles of familial interaction and child-rearing strategies to preventing the development of aggression by intervention. The authors focus on the roles of social context, biology, and learning while studying their transactional interaction.

288 pages, Paperback

First published December 12, 1971