Agnew's General Strain Theory

General strain theory is a transformation of many theories into the best possible version of the theory. Agnew created a vision of society, race, gender, and strain that affect a lot of people how they cope with that strain is what determines their future. They found this and theorized this, including how the strains can begin and adding more of into those categories. What I focused on is the broad view on general strain theory.

Origin of the Theory

Agnew in the 1980’s transformed numerous versions of the strain theories to theorize a version we now know as the general strain theory. It includes similar models that others have proposed like Merton, Cohen, and Cloward and Ohlin. Although Agnew enhanced his theory by expanding the range

to not only concentrating on the lower class individuals. An immense change was the amount of strain identified, knowing that we feel a lot of strain in our everyday lives this can lead people without the proper coping mechanisms to commit crime. This theory comes from an evolution of other theories that didn’t connect the full potential of the theory and how much effect it has on the whole society instead of just a pocket.
Empirical Research
I began by looking at a research study conducted by Broidy, she began by saying that “General strain theory does not propose a direct relationship between strain and delinquency; instead, it proposes one that is mediated by negative affective states and available coping strategies” (Broidy, 2001, p.12).

This thinking proposed a new hypothesis based “on the relationship among strain, negative emotions, legitimate coping, and criminal/deviant outcomes. Their method came from self-report survey, and a nonrandom sample of undergraduate students at Northwestern University. Since this theory is based around behavioral characteristics one of the greatest ways to get the research is to run self report surveys; that is why this method was chosen and due to the larger sample quantity it made it easier to get back quality surveys. This study ended with a total of eight 896 students. This study is a smaller sample to see how the results come out and how the theory tests accordingly and if they can expand. They asked questions about five different sections: stain, negative emotions, legitimate coping strategies, illegitimate/deviant outcomes, and control variables. This study focused on how the different types of strain affected these students and how or if it leads to delinquency behavior or anger. This study offered support for general strain theory, but the discrepancies were the amount of support they showed for the strain/crime relationship. “Results suggest that strains are

associated with anger and other negative emotions” (Broidy, 2001, p.29). This article shows general support for the theory and connection between strain, anger, and those who can’t legitimately cope.
Next I found a study that extends the general strain theory to focus on how personality traits can affects the response. “Traits refer to relatively stable ways of perceiving, thinking about, and behaving toward the environment and oneself” (Blackburn, 1993). The data used for this study comes from the second wave of the National Survey of Children. The first survey occurred in 1976 and had a sample of 2,300 kids between seven and eleven years old. The next survey occurred five years later in 1981, they used a subsample of wave one. They used 1,423, which is an 82% percent selection rate. For the method Agnew et al. used interviews with the child’s teacher and parent. Specifically tied to children they bring up a big issue of being picked on by kids, this strain has a tendency to push the smaller kids to use illegal coping mechanisms. “In particular, delinquency is higher among those who experience family, school, and neighborhood strain; it is higher among certain categories of juveniles experiencing peer abuse.” (Agnew et al., 2002, p. 63). This study is different because it tests nationally instead of just a generalized location getting a broad spectrum of how people react to strain. This shows support for general strain theory and response to individuals most likely to have strain in their life and react with delinquent behavior. This heavily examines the response kids are likely to have to strain; one of those behaviors is delinquent which stems from an illegal coping mechanism.
Mazerolle completed a study that focused directly on the independent strain between men and women and how separately they are affected by it and react to it. The data used came from the National Youth Survey, which was taken in waves. Wave one began in 1976 and of the 2,360 eligible candidates, 1,725 participated in the study. The used the interview method to collect data on the candidates about pervious delinquent acts in the previous year. They found in some areas that men were more likely to have delinquent peers, delinquent dispositions, and adverse relationships with adults. Women tend to have more positive affects when faced with strain better grades, and stronger moral beliefs. In this study they found a direct correlation between males and neighborhood problems and negative relations with adults that can lead to delinquency. Females find that negative life events and negative relations with adults as well can lead to delinquency. Though the study found information on each gender and how they could behave leading to delinquent behavior the research didn’t allow for gender crossover comparison to see theoretically between gender groups. Resulting in crime they noticed property related crimes there were little to no difference crossing gender roles; within violent related crimes they found males reacted to strain with additional anger leading to extreme delinquent behavior. This study shows support for general strain theory in two ways; the first impact strain can lead to delinquent behavior in numerous ways, and next gender plays a role on the type of strain and behavior that takes place.
Mazerolle, Piquero, and Capowich focused on how general strain theory, situational and dispositional anger, and crime and linked.

This theory used undergraduate students in the spring of 1997, focusing on all levels and eliminating labs and directed study. All data collection occurred in the classroom with the professors’ approval. There were a total of 414 enrolled students, while 382 students completed the questionnaire. The method was a scenario questionnaire passed out during the duration of a class. The students were given two different hypothetical although believable situations and asked to rate how they felt about them and estimate how they would behave in a similar situation. They scaled these situations on a zero to ten basis. The first scenario they were faced with was assault, and the following scenario was shoplifting. Strain was measured using two negative life events; and the response was the defined behavior. Another section of the questionnaire was more personal and inquired the person to answer questions about the former behavior, beliefs, peers’ criminal activities, and gender. An alternative part of this study was to see how anger affects the levels of strain; as well as the types of anger these types of subjects feel during strain. Situational anger ties more into general strain theory having more of an affect meaning that a specific situation or strain makes people angry in the moment causing somebody to act irrationally and cope illegally. The results

show that situational anger is positively associated with intentions to commit both situations of shoplifting and assault while dispositional anger is only positively associated with the intentions to commit assault. “These results are consistent with GST, which would expect that situational anger should be correlated with deviant outcomes including behavioral intentions to offend” (Mazerolle et al., 2003, p. 143). These results show support for both general strain theory, and the behaviors leading to anger and crime. The support for this theory was stronger than most showing that in general most normal college students with generally good beliefs and within the norm could assault someone in specific situations. This study focused on anger more than delinquency behavior, though still had it as an underlying factor.