Lin Ping Choo, age 10, of Rexdale, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, for his question:

WHAT CAUSES ANGER?

Anger is an emotion that expresses extreme displeasure. It is one of the basic emotions of the human mind, like fear or love.

Like all natural responses, anger serves a most useful purpose, but to do so it must be carefully controlled. Mentally, extreme anger can interfere with logical thought and can make it difficult to pass sound judgments.

A person usually becomes angry when he cannot fulfill some basic need or desire that is important to him. Sometimes when anger itself is frustrated, the individual develops feelings of hostility and hatred toward other persons.

Physically, anger can cause violent reactions in the muscles and in the internal organs. This can make a person flush and tremble, and show other signs of disturbance.