Aggressive behavior and psychosocial health among children

Aggressive behavior among school children is a worldwide major concern. This is particularly true in a post-socialist country like Hungary where the liberalization processes of society has led to an increase of stress, drug use and crime. The main goal of the present study is to investigate the relationship between different expression forms of aggressive behavior (that is, verbal aggression, physical aggression, and anger), psychosomatic health and health behavior in a middle school aged children population in Szeged, Hungary. Data were collected from middle school students (N = 550; aged between 10 and 15 years; 54.7 percent males) using randomly selected classes from four schools in distinct school districts in Szeged, Hungary. The self-administered questionnaires contained items on sociodemographics (age, gender); school achievement; height and weight (BMI); self-perceived health; health behaviors; psychosomatic health and three forms of aggressive behaviors (measured by The Aggression Questionnaire). Boys are engaged in more physical aggression but not in verbal aggression and anger. Findings suggest that aggression is an important predictor of children's psychosomatic health, self-perceived health and health behaviors. In boys, physical aggression was a predictor of substance use and other health behaviors, in girls, anger was the most important influencing factor of psychosocial health. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.