Expressing aggression increases rather than relieves subsequent aggression.

Evidence

In a peripherally relevant study, Loew (1967) showed that participants trained to speak aggressive verbs during a learning task delivered more extreme electric shocks to a peer. While these results seem to disconfirm the notion of catharsis in the expression of hostility, the target of hostility in Loew’s study was explicitly not an ethnic outgroup member, and the aggressive verbs were explicitly not ethnophaulisms. Nevertheless, these results suggest that intergroup hostility is exacerbated, and not cathartically ameliorated, by the use of antilocutions. More generally, “releasing” aggression has been shown to increase, not to decrease, subsequent aggression (Bushman, 2002). — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice, 1276

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the commonsense “vent it out” / catharsis hypothesis in anger management — echoes findings from the reader’s notes on aggression and emotional regulation in other behavioral-science texts.
• QUESTION: Bushman 2002 — could chase the exact experimental design showing venting aggression escalates it.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — John F. Dovidio, Peter Glick, Laurie A. Rudman, On the Nature of Prejudice: Fifty Years…, 1276