Paper

Low competitive status elicits aggression: behavioral and neural evidence

Buades-Rotger, Macia, Kraemer, Ulrike M, Goettlich, Martin, Petereit, Pauline, Weiblen, Ronja, Scheidt, Thomas, Keevil, Brian G

2020

Overview

Winners are commonly assumed to compete more aggressively than losers. Here, we find overwhelming evidence for the opposite. We first demonstrate that low-ranking teams commit more fouls than they receive in top-tier soccer, ice hockey, and basketball leagues. We replicate this effect in the laboratory, showing that participants deliver louder sound blasts to a rival when placed in a low-status position. Using neuroimaging, we characterize brain activity patterns that encode competitive status as well as those that facilitate status-dependent aggression. These analyses reveal three key findings. First, anterior hippocampus and striatum contain multivariate representations of competitive status. Second, interindividual differences in status-dependent aggression are linked with a sharper status differentiation in the striatum and with greater reactivity to status-enhancing victories in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex. Third, activity in ventromedial, ventrolateral, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is associated with trial-wise increases in status-dependent aggressive behavior. Taken together, our results run counter to narratives glorifying aggression in competitive situations. Rather, we show that those in the lower ranks of skill-based hierarchies are more likely to behave aggressively and identify the potential neural basis of this phenomenon. Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. Footnotes * https://osf.io/2jvx4/

• Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press
• Subject: Activity patterns / Aggression / Aggressive behavior / Cortex (cingulate) / Neostriatum / Neuroimaging / Prefrontal cortex