Toward a Typology of the Aggressive Personality

Abstract

Efforts to develop an empirically derived typology of a major component of the implicit aggressive personality are described. A variety of samples (from both student and work populations) completed the Conditional Reasoning Test for Aggression (CRT-A; James, McIntyre, Glisson, Bowler, and Mitchell, 2004; James et al., 2005). Individual scores on the CRT-A were analyzed utilizing cluster analytic methodology in order to develop a typology of the key defense mechanisms used by the implicit aggressive personality. The resulting clusters were analyzed using affirmation analysis (Feild and Schoenfeldt, 1975) to test the reliability of each. A useful system for classifying the implicit aggressive personality resulted from this endeavor. It is expected that both scientists and practitioners can use this typology as a means for classifying aggressive individuals. Implications include the development of an organizing framework facilitating scientific communication in research on the aggressive personality as well as a classification system for organizations to identify those applicants and incumbents that might be potentially detrimental to the well-being of their coworkers.