Study On The Group Counseling For The Male Criminals With Impulsive Aggressive Behaviors

More and more attentions are paid to use psychological methods to correct criminals in prison by policemen in mainland China recently. Despite of lots of psychological correction attempts in practice, there are few professional psychological correction models which are supported by theories, and few systematic and thorough researches on criminals' aggressive behaviors. Former studies have shown that: the great majority of aggressive behaviors are aroused by impulse, and the impulsive personality trait influences their corrections in prison. Based on these researches, this study tries to use grouping counseling to correct male adult criminals' impulsive aggressions, aiming at changing or decreasing their aggressive behaviors, improving their self-control abilities, and help them adapt to the prison environment and behave better."Impulsive aggressions self-report questionnaires" and "aggressive behaviors self-report questionnaires" are developed in this research. The first questionnaire contains two parts: aggression self-report and impulsion self-report. And we get three factors in each part by factor analysis. They are aggressive performances, hostility and anger. The second one contains four factors after factor analysis. They are physical aggression, language aggression, anger and hostility, and impulsive behaviors. Both questionnaires have high reliability and validity.The experimental group is composed by 12 male adult criminals, and so do the control group, who are selected by "Impulsive aggressions self-report questionnaires". Group counseling program is designed to intervene the experimental group. After group counseling we assess the effects of group counseling by questionnaires developed above, opinions and self-report contents of group members, and semi-structured interviews.The results show that: after ten-times and three-months' group counseling, the impulsive and aggressive levels of the experimental group have decreased comparing before the intervention, and reach significant changes in aspects such as aggression, hostility and anger, impulse and impulsive aggressions. Combined with self-report contents of members in the experimental group, the results also show that: the members' self-control abilities have improved. They think more rationally. They begin learning to use reasonable ways to control their impulse, and their coping strategies are more positive. The post-tests of the two group show that the experimental group has reach a significant better level in hostility and anger behavior control. On the whole, comparing to the control group, the experimental group' impulsive aggression level has decreased, but the decrease is not significant.From the study we can find:1) After group counseling, the participant of the experimental group decrease their impulsive aggression levels, particularly decrease their impulsion, aggression and hostility and anger.2) Psychological group counseling based on rational emotional behavior theory is an effective way to correct male adults' impulsive aggressions.