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The Resident-intruder Paradigm: A Standardized Test for Aggression, Violence and Social Stress

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Published on: July 4, 2013

Real-life revenge may not effectively deter norm violations.

Maartje Elshout¹, Rob M A Nelissen², Ilja van Beest²

¹CentERdata.

The Journal of Social Psychology

|October 30, 2019

Summary

Real-life revenge is common but often delayed and differs in domain from the original offense. These findings challenge lab-based revenge studies and suggest varied motives for destructive acts.

Keywords:

Revenge aggression retaliation vengeance violence

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Area of Science:

Social Psychology
Criminology
Behavioral Science

Background:

Revenge is a complex human emotion and behavior.
Previous research on revenge has largely relied on laboratory studies, potentially limiting ecological validity.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate the characteristics of real-life revenge acts.
To compare real-life revenge behaviors with findings from experimental revenge research.

Main Methods:

A demographically diverse sample of individuals described autobiographical revenge acts and the preceding offenses.
Participants and independent raters assessed the severity, timing, and motives of both the offense and the revenge act.
Independent raters also coded the domains of the acts.

Main Results:

Real-life revenge is as common as suggested by lab studies.
Revenge acts are typically delayed responses, not immediate.
While similar in severity to the original offense, revenge acts often occur in a different domain.

Conclusions:

The characteristics of real-life revenge contradict typical lab-based findings, which often assume immediate, same-domain responses.
Delayed and domain-shifted revenge may not effectively serve a deterrence function.
Alternative motives may drive more destructive instances of revenge.