Women, Anger Expression, Relational and Health Consequences: A Review of the Literature.

Women's anger expression style has been the focus of several recent studies and has been demonstrated to have deleterious effects on emotional and physical health. The purpose of this study was to review the empirical literature for women's anger expression style and related health and relational consequences. The study reviewed emotion induction, self-report inventories and questionnaires as well as activities to evaluate stress, health, and emotional reactions. What can be surmised from this study is that not much more is known now than prior to completion of the research. Results show that younger women may be likely to express their anger more freely, but this finding may be the result of the sample and the impact of society. Women are still more conflicted about expressing anger then men are. Whether this is due to the role of relationship in a woman's life or the level of mutuality in the relationship is yet to be discovered. It is known that societal changes have turned the role of women upside down. The review addresses questions raised by this research and concludes with a discussion of future directions and goals for research in this area. (Contains 50 references.) (MKA)