Open Journal of Social Sciences, 2016, 4, 279-292 Published Online March 2016 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/jss http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jss.2016.43035 How to cite this paper: Bekiari, A. and Hasanagas, N. (2016) Suggesting Indicators of Superficiality and Purity in Verbal Ag- gressiveness: An Application in Adult Education Class Networks of Prison Inmates. Open Journal of Social Sciences, 4, 279- 292. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/jss.2016.43035 Suggesting Indicators of Superficiality and Purity in Verbal Aggressiveness: An Application in Adult Education Class Networks of Prison Inmates Alexandra Bekiari, Nikolaos Hasanagas Faculty of Physical Education and Sports Science, University of Thessaly, Thessaly, Greece Received 21 February 2016; accepted 27 March 2016; published 30 March 2016 Copyright © 2016 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Abstract Aim of this research is to suggest indicators, based on social network analysis, that distinguish superficial, idiosyncratic and strategic verbal aggressiveness. Two classes of an adult education school (at secondary level) in a prison have been selected as network samples (A class = 23 and B class = 12 prisoners). Complete network analysis has been applied, using standardized question- naires. The network variables have further processed through Pearson correlation. Indicators of superficial and pure roles, particularly incremental and proportional behavior, have been applied in two forms of verbal aggressiveness (criticism and threatening). The superficial behavior (SB: outdegree of verbal aggressiveness) seems to be a quite sensitive indicator, as it presents correla- tions with various other relational forms of familiarity, aggressiveness and appreciation/sociali- zation. The incremental behavior (IB: difference of received from outgoing actions) is also a sensi- tive indicator, revealing, however, different results. Pure aggressiveness (in terms of difference) seems to be related with quite different causes and/or occasions than the superficial aggressive- ness. Incremental behavior is likely to be at first place driven by the idiosyncrasy rather than by exogenous factors and seems to constitute a completely different notion than the SB. The propor- tional behavior (PB: ration of outgoing to the received actions) of aggression is a quite insensitive indicator, as it depends only on a few behavioral variables. It seems to reveal a rational strategy of adaptability. Thus, it characteristically differs from the indicators of superficiality (expressing re- ciprocity patterns) and of the incremental aggressiveness (expressing individualism). Keywords Verbal Aggressiveness, Prisoners, Social Network Analysis, Superficial, Incremental, Proportional Behavior