NCJ Number
139706
Journal
Criminology Volume: 30 Issue: 4 Dated: (November 1992) Pages: 475-500
Date Published
1992
Length
26 pages
Annotation
A sample of 1,380 New Jersey adolescents participated in a home interview and a full day of questionnaires, tests, and examinations to test the general strain theory (GST) of crime and delinquency.
Abstract
This theory holds that strain occurs when people are prevented from achieving positively valued goals, are denied positively threatened stimuli that they possess, or are presented with negatively valued stimuli. The two hypotheses tested in this study are that measures of the three types of strain will have a positive effect on delinquency and drug use when measures of social control and differential association are controlled for, and that these effects will be conditioned by key variables, namely delinquent friends and self-efficacy. Strain measures used here included negative life events, life hassles, negative relations with adults, parental fighting, neighborhood problems, unpopularity with the opposite sex, occupational strain, and clothing strain. Social control measures included parental attachment, parental permissiveness, school attachment, peer attachment, time spent on homework, grades, and educational goals. Delinquency and drug use were measured through self-report scales. The data supported the general strain theory by being substantially correlated to delinquency and moderately associated with drug use. Interactions with delinquent friends was a much more significant variable than self-efficacy in terms of impact on the relationship between strain and delinquency or drug use. 4 tables, 8 notes, 1 appendix and 45 references