Aggravating factors are contributing details that make a crime more severe. These factors can result in a harsher sentence. Aggravating factors include things like committing the crime in front of a child, inflicting a high level of harm to the victim, etc. In other words, aggravating factors are things that make the crime worse than it already is.
A lack of remorse is also considered an aggravating factor. For example, if a person kills another person and shows no signs of regret or remorse, this can increase the severity of the situation, and lead to a longer sentence. Even if two crimes are identical, the sentences can be different. This is largely due to aggravating factors. For example, if a man commits assault and battery on his wife, the sentence can be significantly different if he does it in front of his children and/or if he causes her a lot of harm.