A review of treatment efficacy for individuals with anger problems: conceptual, assessment, and methodological issues

The purpose of this paper is to integrate conceptual and methodological issues in order to provide a comprehensive analysis of the treatment of anger problems. This integration of conceptual and methodological issues is first addressed by reporting the results of an effect size analysis that compared various intervention strategies within different treatment outcome assessment methods. Second, there is a review and critique of the theories and models of anger that serve as the rationales for the different treatment approaches. Finally, in order to address conceptual weaknesses in the anger literature, anger is defined and the processes of anger are described using a multidimensional-associationistic model of emotion (Berkowitz, 1994). This multidimensional-associationistic framework is contrasted with a recent anger framework proposed by Eckhardt and Deffenbacher (1995). Finally, implications of the multidimensional-associationistic anger framework for conceptualization, assessment, and treatment of anger problems are discussed.