Understanding and Addressing Adolescent Aggression and Interpersonal Violence

Dear Colleagues,

The adolescence phase is a critical period, marked by intense physical, cognitive, and emotional changes. These transformations play a significant role in shaping adult identity and personality stability. However, this period is also characterized by heightened arousal due to biological and physiological changes, notably in the prefrontal cortex, which is crucial for metacognition, self-regulation, and self-evaluation. The incomplete development of this brain region during adolescence contributes to increased vulnerability to affective and behavioral dysregulation, which can manifest as internalized and externalized problems, including aggressive behaviors and interpersonal conflicts.

Recent research underscores a concerning trend, which is the prevalence of violent behaviors and conflicts among adolescents being on the rise, with a notable increase in reported incidents of interpersonal violence. This escalation highlights the urgency of understanding the underpinnings of adolescent aggression and developing effective strategies for intervention.

This call for papers invites scholars to contribute to a Special Issue entitled "Understanding and Addressing Adolescent Aggression and Interpersonal Violence." This issue aims to explore the complexities of adolescent development as it pertains to aggression and violence, focusing on the following areas:

1. Biological and Physiological Influences: Examination of how puberty-related changes and prefrontal cortex development impact arousal, self-regulation, and aggression.
2. Identity and Emotional Regulation: Studies on how the processes of identity formation and emotional regulation contribute to or mitigate the risk of aggressive behaviors and interpersonal conflicts among adolescents.
3. Defense Mechanisms and Coping Strategies: Research on the role of defense strategies, ranging from immature to mature, and their effectiveness in managing unwelcome realities and emotional disturbances that may potentially lead to aggression.
4. Mentalizing and Social Cognition: Insights into how impairments in mentalizing—the ability to understand the mental states of oneself and others—affect adolescents' social interactions and propensity for aggression.
5. Environmental and Social Factors: Analyses of the influence of family dynamics, peer relationships, and societal pressures on adolescent behavior and the development of aggressive tendencies.
6. Prevalence and Patterns of Adolescent Fights: Empirical studies that document the incidence, contexts, and types of aggressive behaviors and fights among adolescents, with a focus on geographical, cultural, and socio-economic variations.
7. Interventions and Prevention Strategies: Evaluations of existing programs and the development of new interventions aimed at reducing aggression and promoting positive social behaviors among adolescents.

Submissions may include original research articles, systematic reviews, theoretical frameworks, and evaluations of intervention programs. Contributions should not only enhance our understanding of adolescent aggression and interpersonal violence, but also offer practical insights for policymakers, educators, and mental health professionals who are working to address these issues.

Prof. Dr. Paola Carbone
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Adolescents is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• aggressive behaviors
• violence
• adolescence

Title: Analysis regarding the effectiveness of an intervention program for equality and prevention of gender violence in adolescents
Authors: Nieves Marta Díaz Gómez
Affiliation: Universidad de la Laguna, San Cristobal de La Laguna, Spain
Abstract: Purpose. The objective of this study was to analyse the effect of an educational intervention for the promotion of equality and the prevention of gender violence regarding sexist attitudes. Methods. An educational intervention study (pre-post), controlled and randomized, was carried out on 561 high school students, between October 2019 and January 2021. Their explicit sexist attitudes were measured with the scale of sexist, violent and stereotyped attitudes (SVSA) and using the Gender Role Attitudes Scale (GRAS), and their implicit sexist attitudes through the assessment of the behaviour of the lead character of a story, in which an interaction between two young people with an ambiguous component of gender violence is described. Four temporal measurements were made: pre-intervention and post-intervention; immediate, 6 months and 12 months. Results.Explicit and implicit sexist attitudes decreased after participating in the intervention, with a decrease in the average score of the SVSA scale that went from 28.7±7.7 to 21.8±2.1 (p