Self-Witnessing Report on the
Age of Rage
Personal Experiences of Rage
Charisse Ono
Psychology 409a
Spring 2001
Discussion:
The three episodes of rage that I have focused on, Shopping Rage, Phone Rage, and Pedestrian Rage are a record of personal experiences that I have encountered within this past semester. The main aspect of the episodes of rage that I would like to focus on is why these episodes escalated to a rage episode.
The definition of anger is defined by, Charles Spielberger, PhD, from the article Controlling Anger Before It Controls You as being "an emotional state that varies in intensity from mild irritation to intense fury and rage." In addition he also stated that anger can be caused by both external and internal events. In my personal experiences I had both external and internal events of rage. During my Shopping Rage and Pedestrian Rage my rage was due to an external force, the sales manager and the pedestrian. Lastly, my Phone Rage was rage of an internal force, the irritation of not finding what I was looking for.
Whether the rage is due to an internal or external force the rage must be confronted or dissolved by realizing the source of the. According the article Controlling Anger Before It Controls You, it states "that anger is a natural, adapt response to threats; it inspires powerful, often aggressive, feelings and behaviors, which allows us to fight and to defend ourselves when we are attacked." Through the information I gathered from this article I created the following chart to explain the causes of my rage episodes.
|
Rage |
Internal or External | Reason for Rage | Resolution of the Rage |
| Shopping Rage | External | the need to defend myself against the sales manager | remain calm and remove myself from the stressor (the sales manager) |
| Phone Rage | Internal | frustration due to not being able to find information | use humor as a means to release myself from the raging emotions |
| Pedestrian rage | External | adaptive response to threats (the threat that I would harm another cause by their action) | use relaxation during the episode till I was able to remove myself from the stressor |
Through the article I was able to identify whether my rage episode was of an external or internal source. From there I was able to clearly identify the reason and resolution for my rage episode. After looking at the my data I found that in my three episodes of rage, if the rage was of an external source my solution was to remove my self from the situation while using a form a relaxation method. Then for my internal episode I found that humor was the best way to deal without he situation.
Self-Witnessing Observations
Shopping
Rage
Phone Rage
Pedestrian Rage
Discussion of Self-Witnessing Experiences
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