Scientists, Please Read

[Victus]

Down21 wrote

Im just wondering how good a model for instrumental aggression is this computer game? Im sure you could get a few false positives, since it is a lot easier to virtually mug somebody. Are you allowed ask for histories of aggressive behaviour/ criminal conviction etc. and then correlate that with your top 10% ers?

There are a few problems with this...

1) Most university students aren't going to have a criminal record, aside from underage drinking and the like, certainly almost none would have violent offenses on their records (compared to the forensic samples where almost all of them have violent records).

2) Even if the sample did contain a bizare amount of previous offenders, it would almost be the same as measuring the forensic samples, where instrumental aggression in psychopaths is established.

3) It's quite likely that at least some bottom 10% PPI scoring participants will commit instrumental aggression (if we're to agree that this tests that behavior). However on the whole, they should show much less of it than those in the top 10% of the PPI factors being measured.

So far I'm considering making 'level of necesity' a variable, where in one group is told that they must finish 1st in order to receive the reward and the other is not.