It goes without saying that, anger is one of those emotions that can be destructive and lead to various problems if it goes unnoticed. Although it can be tough sometimes, with the various types of anger around, recognizing when anger first occurs, is a key factor in determining what to do when it rears its ugly head.

Here are 12 of the most common kinds of anger – see if you recognize any of these descriptions.

• Behavioral Anger – This type of anger usually describes someone who is aggressive towards whatever triggered their anger… this can be another person. This can be someone who always seems to act out, or is troublesome. Sometimes the outcome is physical abuse or attacks against others.

• Passive Anger - People who use sarcasm or mockery as a way to hide their feelings, typically express this form of anger. They tend to avoid confrontations with people or situations.

• Verbal Anger – Anger that’s expressed mostly through words and not actions. Verbal abuse is used to criticize and insult people (put them down) and complain.

• Constructive Anger – This type of anger is a key factor in driving people to want to join movements and groups. It’s the feeling of being fed up with how things are going, and the need to make a positive change.

• Self-inflicted Anger – Anger that translates in causing harm to one’s own body. People who use this type of anger are acting out by punishing themselves for something they’ve done wrong. Some examples include starvation, cutting, and overeating.

• Volatile Anger – This form of anger occurs in varying degrees… it comes and goes. It can just appear out of nowhere, or build into something bigger. It can either explode or go unnoticed. It could even be expressed verbally or physically.

• Chronic Anger – Ever come across someone that’s seemingly angry for no reason, or mad all the time? More than likely, they were exhibiting this type of anger. People with chronic anger are just mad in general.

• Judgmental Anger – Putting other people down and making them feel bad about themselves, or abilities, is a form of judgmental anger. This person expresses their feelings by making those around them feel worthless.

• Overwhelmed Anger – This person relieves stress by shouting, and flying off the handle, when they can’t take situations and things that are happening around them, anymore. When things are just too overwhelming… which is why it’s called ‘overwhelmed anger’.

• Retaliatory Anger – This is probably one of the most common, of the bunch. Retaliatory anger usually occurs as a direct response to someone else lashing out at you… has that happened to you once or twice ?

• Paranoid Anger – This anger comes about when someone feels jealousy towards others, because they feel other people have or want to take what’s rightfully theirs. Or they may act out because they feel intimidated by others.

• Deliberate Anger – Using anger to gain power over a situation or person. A person expressing this form of anger may not start out angry, but will get angry when something does not turn out the way they wanted. Or, someone doesn’t see eye to eye with something they planned.

These are the most common types of anger. As we mentioned at the beginning of this article, being aware of anger when it first appears is one of the first steps to master in order to make different choices in how to react.

The next step is knowing what to do when anger rears its ugly head.

If you, or someone you know is interested in getting more details on what to do, there are a few good books that cover the subject of anger management; many of them are available on Amazon.com. Typing anger management in Amazon’s search field, will pull up results of books that cover this subject.

One book that’s highly rated by Amazon customers is Anger Management for Dummies.

Here are some excerpts of what customers had to say:

…You don’t have to be an angry person to read this book…~ Michelle Duncan

… It actually has suggestions and recommendations that most people would be able to apply on a daily basis… ~ Catherine Kimball

…Excellent information, written in an easy to read and absorb format... ~ David A. Fish

Here’s a short video review of the book, here: Anger Management for Dummies review.