Children with Violent or Aggressive Behaviour
The frequency of physical aggression in humans peaks at around 2–3 years of age. It then declines gradually on average. These observations suggest that physical aggression is not only a learned behaviour but that development provides opportunities for the learning and biological development of self-regulation. However, a small subset of children fail to acquire all the necessary self-regulatory abilities and tend to show atypical levels of physical aggression across development.
These children may be at risk for later violent behaviour or, conversely, lack of aggression that may be considered necessary within society. By school age, children should learn more socially appropriate forms of communicating than aggressive behaviour such as hitting or biting. This includes being able to exress themselves through verbal or written language. Physical fear of others and family difficulties are examples of things that may trigger aggressive behaviour in children.
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