Anger vs. Aggression

Anger vs. Aggression

Aggression is not the same as anger, though people readily confuse the two. A person can be very aggressive and mug someone in the street, but they needn’t be angry with the victim to perform this callous act. It is far more likely the motivation behind this behavior is the desire to steal valuables from the victim. Conversely, one can be angry with someone and not behave aggressively towards them.

Aggression is often defined as any behavior directed toward another individual that is carried out with the intent to cause harm (e.g., Rohlf, Holl, Kirsch, Krahé & Elsner, 2018). Perhaps someone is doing or saying something you don’t like, so you retaliate (e.g., threatening them with violence) in a bid to stop them from doing or saying it. That is aggression. Anger, on the other hand, is the state of emotional and physiological arousal. It has been described as a feeling that involves a strong, uncomfortable, and emotional response to a perceived provocation.

Anger may have physical effects. It may increase our heart rate, blood pressure, and levels of the hormones adrenaline and noradrenaline. Anger is thought to trigger part of the fight or flight brain response. The external expression of anger can be found in facial expressions, body language, physiological responses, and at times in acts of aggression. Psychologists view anger as a primary emotion experienced by humans, and as something that is necessary for survival. Anger can mobilize psychological resources to enable us to take action to help ourselves, but on the less positive side, uncontrolled anger and acts of aggression can negatively affect personal or social well-being.

Course excerpt from:

Managing Anger & Aggressive BehaviorManaging Anger & Aggressive Behavior is a 3-hour online continuing education (CE) course that provides strategies for dealing with anger and aggression in clinical practice.

Healthcare professionals in every specialty have had experiences with anger and aggression, sometimes finding themselves the target of their clients’ anger. We are human, and all of us are subject to the full range of human emotions, even as therapists within the context of professional encounters with our clients. While anger is perfectly normal and almost universally experienced and expressed by individuals, it can become highly problematic when it is excessive in frequency and duration and is disproportionate to the event or person who triggered it.

The intent of this course is to address four interrelated topics: (1) understanding anger, (2) managing one’s own anger, (3) managing aggressive behavior from others, and (4) teaching clients to manage problematic anger. We will explore the different ways in which people can express outrage, including the commonly encountered forms of aggression (passive aggression, covert aggression, overt aggression, and outright hostility), and provide strategies for dealing with aggressors. As a foundation, we will also discuss coping strategies for managing our own anger and frustration as we go about our daily lives. Course #31-16 | 2019 | 53 pages | 20 posttest questions

Click here to learn more and enroll.

Course Directions

This online course provides instant access to the course materials (PDF download) and CE test. After enrolling, click on My Account and scroll down to My Active Courses. From here you’ll see links to download/print the course materials and take the CE test (you can print the test to mark your answers on it while reading the course document).

Click here to learn more and enroll.

CE Information

Professional Development Resources is approved to sponsor continuing education by the American Psychological Association (APA); the National Board of Certified Counselors (NBCC ACEP #5590); the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB Provider #1046, ACE Program); the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA Provider #3159); the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA Provider #AAUM); the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR Provider #PR001); the Alabama State Board of Occupational Therapy; the Florida Boards of Social Work, Mental Health Counseling and Marriage and Family Therapy (#BAP346), Psychology & School Psychology (#50-1635), Dietetics & Nutrition (#50-1635), and Occupational Therapy Practice (#34);  the Georgia State Board of Occupational Therapy; the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors (#MHC-0135); the Ohio Counselor, Social Worker & MFT Board (#RCST100501); the South Carolina Board of Professional Counselors & MFTs (#193); the Texas Board of Examiners of Marriage & Family Therapists (#114) and State Board of Social Worker Examiners (#5678); and is CE Broker compliant (all courses are reported within a few days of completion).

Earn CE Wherever YOU Love to Be!

Managing Anger & Aggressive Behavior

Managing Anger & Aggressive Behavior

Managing Anger & Aggressive Behavior is a new 3-hour online continuing education (CE) course that provides strategies for dealing with anger and aggression in clinical practice.

Healthcare professionals in every specialty have had experiences with anger and aggression, sometimes finding themselves the target of their clients’ anger. We are human, and all of us are subject to the full range of human emotions, even as therapists within the context of professional encounters with our clients. While anger is perfectly normal and almost universally experienced and expressed by individuals, it can become highly problematic when it is excessive in frequency and duration and is disproportionate to the event or person who triggered it.

Click here to learn more and enroll.

The intent of this course is to address four interrelated topics: (1) understanding anger, (2) managing one’s own anger, (3) managing aggressive behavior from others, and (4) teaching clients to manage problematic anger. We will explore the different ways in which people can express outrage, including the commonly encountered forms of aggression (passive aggression, covert aggression, overt aggression, and outright hostility), and provide strategies for dealing with aggressors. As a foundation, we will also discuss coping strategies for managing our own anger and frustration as we go about our daily lives. Course #31-16 | 53 pages | 20 posttest questions

Course Directions

This online course provides instant access to the course materials (PDF download) and CE test. After enrolling, click on My Account and scroll down to My Active Courses. From here you’ll see links to download/print the course materials and take the CE test (you can print the test to mark your answers on it while reading the course document).

Click here to learn more and enroll.

CE Information

Professional Development Resources is approved to sponsor continuing education by the American Psychological Association (APA); the National Board of Certified Counselors (NBCC ACEP #5590); the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB Provider #1046, ACE Program); the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA Provider #3159); the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA Provider #AAUM); the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR Provider #PR001); the Alabama State Board of Occupational Therapy; the Florida Boards of Social Work, Mental Health Counseling and Marriage and Family Therapy (#BAP346), Psychology & School Psychology (#50-1635), Dietetics & Nutrition (#50-1635), and Occupational Therapy Practice (#34);  the Georgia State Board of Occupational Therapy; the New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners as an approved provider of continuing education for licensed mental health counselors (#MHC-0135); the Ohio Counselor, Social Worker & MFT Board (#RCST100501); the South Carolina Board of Professional Counselors & MFTs (#193); the Texas Board of Examiners of Marriage & Family Therapists (#114) and State Board of Social Worker Examiners (#5678); and is CE Broker compliant (all courses are reported within a few days of completion).

Earn CE Wherever YOU Love to Be!

Making Peace with Your Feelings of Anger

Dealing with Anger Anger 101: Making Peace with Your Angry Feelings

 

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
—Rumi

Growing up, we are formally taught for at least 13 years how to read, write, and perform basic mathematical equations. We take hundreds of tests, learn to spit out essays, play team sports, and toot on the recorder. But when—and where—do we learn how to deal with our feelings? We are rarely taught about our feelings with any intention. We learn emotion by observing our families and by experimenting in our relationships, mostly without anything that could be construed as constructive feedback.

If you think about any other learning experience in your life—picking up an instrument, starting a job, developing a new skill—you probably had some official starting point when you got information or direction to launch you on your quest. Along the way, you probably got a lot of feedback from a teacher, mentor, or parent.

So how did you learn to process your anger?

The answer is, of course, that most of us never did. Rarely do we learn how to deal with this challenging emotion. People often get professional help only when it is causing them severe distress—for instance, when they are so angry that they have been assigned to anger management classes, or they are so afraid of their own anger that they engage in self-harm, directing it inward instead of toward the appropriate target(s).

How do you identify your (probably unconscious) relationship with anger? Here are some simple exercises to help you explore your anger.

1. Examine the Messages About Anger—Spoken and Unspoken—You Received Growing Up

Did your parents argue? Were they mean or even violent? Was anger simply avoided? Did their differences get resolved?

Were you allowed to be angry and express it? What were the repercussions when you did?

Did your parents apply the same “rules” about anger to themselves as to you and each of your siblings?

Think about the unconscious messages you internalized as “normal” and put them into statements you have carried with you all these years (i.e., “If someone gets angry at me, then I will hurt them worse,” or, “Just surrender your anger to God”). Try not to judge the statement as good or bad; it is just what you have learned.

2. Look at Yourself in Your Relationships

When someone is angry at you, how do you react? Do you just swallow it and internalize it, or do you retaliate and say something that hurts the other person even more?

What about when you get angry? Do your friends and family listen and allow you to express it? Do they ignore it? Do they suddenly accuse you of all the things they have been storing up as resentments?

Do angry feelings just pass for you and do they get resolved? Or do they sit with you and rear their ugly heads when there is a minor issue and suddenly you erupt at some unsuspecting bank clerk? Again, don’t judge yourself.

3. Ask Yourself What You Fear in Expressing Your Anger or Tolerating Someone Else’s

If you understand what you are afraid of when it comes to anger, you will be able to make sensible choices as you begin to deal with it differently. Are you afraid for your safety or for that of a loved one? Then, clearly, it is important to work toward a place where you are generally able to live without fear.

If you make peace with your anger instead of avoiding it or overindulging it, you may find that it no longer feels like a dreaded enemy but rather a caring, if uncomfortable, friend that arises to help you—even move you forward in some way.

If, however, you fear anger because it has always been unsafe in the past, you might choose to practice it with a willing and aware partner or friend. Many of us fear our anger because we worry we will be overwhelmed by it. Or sometimes we experience other people’s anger as criticism of who we are, instead of just applying it to the issue at hand. Sometimes the anger is masking other emotions, such as sadness, which can be easier for some to tolerate.

At this point, you might be thinking I mistakenly advised you to practice your anger.

I meant it!

As I mentioned earlier, we have treated any other skill in life as a process, one which we continue to hone—hopefully with compassionate feedback—and one through which we may need to stumble. If we are willing to allow and accept our anger, we may begin to learn that it is just an emotion—an emotion needing expression, but one that will pass. And like any new skill, it takes time and practice to hone.

If you make peace with your anger instead of avoiding it or overindulging it, you may find that it no longer feels like a dreaded enemy but rather a caring, if uncomfortable, friend that arises to help you—even move you forward in some way.

If you are struggling deeply with your anger, it may be most effective to work on it with a qualified therapist.

© Copyright 2015 by Lillian Rozin, MFA, LCSW, RYT, therapist in Media, PA. All Rights Reserved.

Source:
Anger 101: Making Peace with Your Angry Feelings

CE Courses of Interest:

Self-defeating behaviors are negative on-going patterns of behaviors involving issues such as smoking, weight, inactive lifestyle, depression, anger, perfectionism, etc. This course is designed to teach concepts to eliminate these negative patterns. The course is educational: first you learn the model, then you apply it to a specific self-defeating behavior. A positive behavioral change is the outcome. Following the course, participants will be able to identify, analyze and replace their self-defeating behavior(s) with positive behavior(s). The course also provides an excellent psychological “tool” for clinicians to use with their clients. The author grants limited permission to photocopy forms and exercises included in this course for clinical use. Closeout Course #40-08 | 2007 | 44 pages | 35 posttest questions Click Here to Learn More!

 

This CE test is based on the book “Psychological Treatment of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Fundamentals and Beyond” (2006, 328 pages). The chapters in this practical and insightful guide for helping individuals with this troubling disorder, written by prominent specialists, provide practical, step-by-step descriptions of psychological approaches to treating OCD. After explicating the general, underlying features of the disorder, the contributors to this volume describe evidence-based behavioral and cognitive approaches, such as exposure and ritual prevention and cognitive restructuring. Subsequent chapters discuss how to apply these strategies with particular presentations of OCD, including fears of contamination; doubting and checking; incompleteness concerns; religious, sexual, and aggressive obsessions; and compulsive hoarding. Also included are discussions of more advanced issues, including dealing with treatment resistance and comorbidity and treating OCD in special populations.

Click Here to Learn More!

 

This CE test is based on the book “Anger Management: The Complete Treatment Guidebook for Practitioners” (2002, 320 pages). A comprehensive state-of-the-art anger management program and a must-have manual for the practitioner. The authors are distinguished researchers, teachers and practitioners in the field of anger management, and their book offers a detailed, research-based and empirically validated “anger episode model.” This indispensable resource for human service professionals emphasizes how to help clients understand, manage, and prevent unhealthy anger. The book is packed with detailed procedures, examples, exercises, and client handouts.

Click Here to Learn More!

 

This course will outline biological, behavioral, psychological, social-environmental and mind-body treatment approaches to pain management and introduce techniques and interventions that mental health practitioners can use to be most effective. In addition, participants will be introduced to novel approaches to chronic pain management such as acceptance and commitment therapy, a new psychological treatment that helps clients disidentify with troubling thoughts associated with pain. Case examples will be utilized to illustrate how a mental health practitioner develops appropriate treatment plans for patients with chronic pain. Finally, special topics of interest to mental health practitioners will include: 1) treating chronic pain patients with a history of drug abuse; 2) treating special populations with pain, such as the elderly and patients with AIDS; 3) suicide and pain, and 4) reducing a client’s resistance to participation in psychological treatments.

Click Here to Learn More!

Professional Development Resources is approved by the American Psychological Association (APA) to sponsor continuing education for psychologists; by the National Board of Certified Counselors (NBCC ACEP #5590); by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB Provider #1046, ACE Program); by the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA Provider #3159); by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA Provider #AAUM); by the Commission on Dietetic Registration (CDR Provider #PR001); by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences (#PCE1625); by the Florida Boards of Social Work, Mental Health Counseling and Marriage and Family Therapy (#BAP346), Psychology & School Psychology (#50-1635), Dietetics & Nutrition (#50-1635), Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology, and Occupational Therapy Practice (#34); by the Ohio Counselor, Social Worker & MFT Board (#RCST100501); by the South Carolina Board of Professional Counselors & MFTs (#193); and by the Texas Board of Examiners of Marriage & Family Therapists (#114) and State Board of Social Worker Examiners (#5678).

Anger Management – Only 9 Left!

Via Scoop.itHealthcare Continuing Education

This 8-hour CE course offers a comprehensive state-of-the-art anger management program and is a must-have manual for the practitioner. The authors are distinguished researchers, teachers and practitioners in the field of anger management, and their book offers a detailed, research-based and empirically validated “anger episode model.” This indispensable resource for human service professionals emphasizes how to help clients understand, manage, and prevent unhealthy anger. The book is packed with detailed procedures, examples, exercises, and client handouts. Impact Publishers | 2002 | 304 pages | 36 posttest questions | Course #80-33
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Overstock Sale!

Anger Management: The Complete Treatment Guidebook for Practitioners (8 Hour CE Course)

Overstock Sale! Save $30 and Earn 8 Hours of Continuing Education Credit!

We are overstocked on the continuing education course book, Anger Management: The Complete Treatment Guidebook, and have reduced the price of the course from $109 to $79 in efforts to clear out the stockroom. Price will return to normal once the first 10 copies have sold.

CE Credit: 8 Hours (0.8 CEUs)
Target Audience: Psychology Counseling Social-Work Marriage-and-Family
Learning Level: Intermediate

Course Abstract:
A comprehensive state-of-the-art anger management program and a must-have manual for the practitioner. The authors are distinguished researchers, teachers and practitioners in the field of anger management, and their book offers a detailed, research-based and empirically validated “anger episode model.” This indispensable resource for human service professionals emphasizes how to help clients understand, manage, and prevent unhealthy anger. The book is packed with detailed procedures, examples, exercises, and client handouts. Impact Publishers | 2002 | 304 pages | 36 posttest questions | Course #80-33

Learning Objectives:

  1. List the five components of the anger episode model discussed in the text
  2. Identify six techniques for increasing clients’ awareness of anger
  3. Name four types of exposure used in the change phase of anger management
  4. List the four core irrational beliefs in the Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy model
  5. Identify six skills training areas to be addressed in anger relapse prevention
  6. Name five strategies therapists can use to manage their own anger during sessions

About the Author(s):

Dr. Kassinove received his Ph.D. in Behavior Research Psychology from Adelphi University in 1970. He has since been awarded Diplomat status in Clinical Psychology (1976) and in Behavior Therapy (1988). Dr. Kassinove is the editor of the 1995 text Anger Disorders: Assessment, Diagnosis, and Treatment. He has also published over 50 journal articles. Dr. Kassinove has given lectures literally around the world, on 5 continents, on the topics of anger, anger disorders, and their treatments.
Dr. Tafrate is a clinical psychologist and a fellow of the Albert Ellis Institute. He is an Associate Professor in the Criminology and Criminal Justice Department at Central Connecticut State University. In 1997, Dr. Tafrate co-authored with Dr. Albert Ellis the self-help book, How to Control Your Anger Before it Controls You. His research on the nature and treatment of anger has been published in scientific journals and books for practitioners, and has been presented at conferences throughout the United States and abroad.

Accreditation Statement:

Professional Development Resources is recognized as a provider of continuing education by the following:
AOTA: American Occupational Therapy Association (#3159)
APA: American Psychological Association
ASWB: Association of Social Work Boards (#1046)
CDR: Commission on Dietetic Registration (#PR001)
NBCC: National Board for Certified Counselors (#5590)
NAADAC: National Association of Alcohol & Drug Abuse Counselors (#00279)
California: Board of Behavioral Sciences (#PCE1625)
Florida: Boards of SW, MFT & MHC (#BAP346); Psychology & School Psychology (#50-1635); Dietetics & Nutrition (#50-1635); Occupational Therapy Practice (#34). PDResources is CE Broker compliant.
Illinois: DPR for Social Work (#159-00531)
Ohio: Counselor, Social Worker & MFT Board (#RCST100501)
South Carolina: Board of Professional Counselors & MFTs (#193)
Texas: Board of Examiners of Marriage & Family Therapists (#114) & State Board of Social Worker Examiners (#5678)