Frustration
Posted By Kelly Orange on February 16, 2009
Frustration is an emotional response to circumstances where one is obstructed from arriving at a personal goal. The more important the goal, the greater the frustration. It is comparable to anger and disappointment. Sources of frustration may be internal or external. Internal sources of frustration involve personal deficiencies such as a lack of confidence or fear of social situations that prevent one from reaching a goal. Conflict can also be an internal source of frustration when one has competing goals that interfere with one another. External causes of frustration involve conditions outside the person such as a blocked road; or conditions linked to the person’s actions but not directly such as lack of money, or lack of sexual activity. In psychology, passive-aggressive behavior is a method of dealing with frustration. According to N.E. Miller “frustration produces instigation to a number of different types of response, one of which is an instigation to some form of aggression.”
To the individual experiencing frustration, the emotion may more times than not be attributed to external factors which are beyond their control. Although mild frustration due to internal factors (e.g. laziness, lack of effort) is often a positive force (inspiring motivation), it is more often than not a perceived uncontrolled problem that instigates more severe, and perhaps pathological, frustration. An individual suffering from pathological frustration will often feel powerless to change the situation they are in, leading to frustration and, if left uncontrolled, further anger.
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