Healthy, wealthy, and wise: Incorporating health issues as a source of strain in Agnew's general strain theory

doi:10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2010.09.003

Journal of Criminal Justice

Volume 38, Issue 6, November–December 2010, Pages 1150-1159

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2010.09.003 Get rights and content

Abstract

The current study uses Agnew's general strain theory (GST) as a foundation to argue that poor health may lead to delinquency. Those who suffer frequently from minor health problems and lack resources to afford proper medical care are expected to experience elevated levels of health-related strain, negative emotional affect, and report engaging in more delinquent acts. Using longitudinal data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), negative binomial regression models were estimated and show that health strains increase the subsequent frequency of non-violent delinquency even when controlling for important demographic and theoretically derived variables. Health strain's influence on non-violent delinquency was not conditioned by anger, depression, self-esteem, low constraint, or religiosity. Implications for GST are discussed and a modest research agenda for investigating health strain is identified.

Research Highlights

►Using data from waves I and II of the Add Health, elevated levels of health problems had statistically significant influences on subsequent self-reported property offending and general delinquency, regardless of other important demographic and theoretically relevant variables. ►Elevated levels of health problems did not have a statistically significant influence on subsequent self-reported violence ►Health problems among adolescents were concluded to be sources of strain that should be incorporated into Agnew's General Strain Theory. ►Few interactions between health-related strain and coping strategies and health related strain and conditioning factors were found to predict delinquency and offending.

Introduction

The American dream is much more complex than the desire to be financially successful. People desire not only money and status, but also independence, good health, and the respect of their peers. Strain and anomie theories of crime and delinquency have often focused heavily on financial and educational aspirations while omitting other potentially relevant variables. Ben Franklin noted three core desires of Americans in the simple phrase “healthy, wealthy, and wise.” While two of those three desires have been extensively explored as sources of crime inducing strain (Paternoster & Mazerolle, 1994, Stack & Wasserman, 2007), issues of health and health care have been largely ignored.

In the current study, Agnew's (1992) GST is used as a basis for explaining how issues of poor health can lead to crime and delinquency. It is argued that health issues may lead to all three forms of strain initially described by Agnew (1992) and fit the description of those strains that are most likely to lead to delinquency (Agnew, 2006a). While a number of health related concerns can induce strain, the current analysis is limited to strains that result from relatively minor conditions such as headaches, joint pain, and nausea that are not so severe that they physically prevent an individual from participating in delinquent activities.

Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (AddHealth) are analyzed to determine if the frequency of health problems adolescents experience influences their subsequent involvement in general crime and delinquency, property crime, and violence. This study also investigates whether having access to health care blocked by either logistical or financial concerns is a significant source of crime inducing strain. The effects of health problems on delinquency are assessed net of other forms of strain, negative affect, low self-control, self-esteem, social support, religiosity, socioeconomic status, and demographic characteristics that could confound the link between health strain and delinquency. Before presenting our results, we discuss past research that has linked health to crime and delinquency, which largely suggests that involvement in crime and delinquency leads to health problems. We then discuss how this relationship can be reversed using GST as a vehicle to argue that health related strains may lead to delinquency.

Section snippets

Previous attempts to link health, crime, and delinquency

There have been numerous attempts to connect fitness, health care, and public health to crime and delinquency. While some studies deny that any significant connections between health care and crime are anything more than a shared effect of socioeconomic status (Rutter & Giller, 1983), others describe health deficiencies as important factors leading to delinquency (Penner, 1982, Selke & Andersson, 2003). Penner (1982) described several forms of juvenile health problems that may lead to

Agnew's GST

Agnew (1992) describes three major sources of strain that can eventually lead to crime and/or delinquency. The first of which is the inability to reach positively valued goals. Strains such as not being able to reach one's financial goals or gain status in a desired group, as described by Merton, 1938, Cohen, 1955 respectively, would fall into this category. Agnew's (1992) second source of strain involves the loss of positively valued stimuli such as a family member or property. The final

The health strain hypothesis

Problems caused by poor health can lead to all three types of strain described by GST. Health related strains may even be more powerful than some of those created by economic or social pressures. Agnew (2006a) notes that strains that are seen as being great in magnitude, unjust, or create an incentive for criminal coping are more likely to lead to crime than other strains. Health related problems frequently may meet one or more of those criteria and could have an influence on emotionality and

Health as sources of general strain

Health issues can lead to strain by blocking an individual's pathway toward a number of goals. By definition, heath problems block the goal that many individuals share of being and remaining healthy. Health strains can also affect an individual's ability to reach other goals through ‘stress proliferation’ (see Slocum, in press). For instance, repeated absences from a job due to health problems such as sickness can prevent a person from obtaining their desired promotion. Those missing more days

How health strain can lead to crime

Strains lead to negative emotional states such as anger, frustration, fear, anxiety, and depression and create pressure for some type of corrective action (Agnew, 2006a). Agnew (1992) claims that crime is more likely to result from strain when the negative emotion experienced is anger. It may be true that illness is likely to cause more anxiety and depression than anger, but Agnew (2006a) does suggest that other negative emotions may also lead to crime and studies have indicated that illness

Data

Data collected in waves I and II of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) were used to assess health related strains on several measures of delinquency. The ADD Health study began in 1994 when participants were grades 7 to 12 and has continued to present day (Harris et al., 2008). Eighty high schools representative of over 26,000 schools in the United States were selected for inclusion in the study through stratified systematic sampling. For each high school, one

Results

Table 2 shows a series of negative binomial regression models that have been estimated in a stepwise fashion for each outcome under investigation, general delinquency, property offending, and violence. In regards to general delinquency, Model A shows the baseline influence of health related strains while considering a more traditional source of strain. Health strain has a positive and significant influence on delinquency, indicating that adolescents who report experiencing more health problems

Interactions: strain and conditioning factors

Since GST predicts that some traits or situations may condition the effect of strain on delinquency, interactions between a number of these variables and each strain strain variable were created and then explored. Mean-centered multiplicative interaction terms were calculated for each of the three types of strain with each of the six conditioning variables: anger, depression, social support, self-esteem, low constraint, and religiosity. As was done in prior GST studies (Johnson & Morris, 2008),

Discussion and conclusion

The current study set out to expand Agnew's GST by theoretically incorporating health problems as a viable source of strain to better understand delinquency and offending. It was argued that health issues can lead to strain and delinquency either by blocking goals, adding noxious stimuli, or removing positive stimuli. Using a sample of U.S. adolescents, a primary goal was to test the main health strain hypothesis that increased health problems will increase involvement in delinquency. The

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Healthy, wealthy, and wise: Incorporating health issues as a source of strain in Agnew's general strain theory

Abstract

Research Highlights

Introduction

Section snippets

Previous attempts to link health, crime, and delinquency

Agnew's GST

The health strain hypothesis

Health as sources of general strain

How health strain can lead to crime

Data

Results

Interactions: strain and conditioning factors

Discussion and conclusion

Journal of Criminal Justice

Social Science & Medicine

Contemporary Educational Psychology

Journal of Criminal Justice

Journal of Criminal Justice

Preventive Medicine

Foundation for a general strain theory of crime and delinquency

Criminology

Pressured into crime: An overview of general strain theory

General strain theory: current status and directions for future research

An empirical test of general strain theory

Criminology

Social behaviour and illness information interact to influence the peer acceptance of children with chronic illness

British Journal of Health Psychology

Life stress, anger and anxiety, and delinquency: An empirical test of general strain theory

Journal of Health & Social Behavior

Life strain, coping, and delinquency in the People's Republic of China: An empirical test of general strain theory from a matching perspective in social support

International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology

Responses to physical activity among children and youths with exercise-induced asthma

Palaestra

Adolescent religiosity and school contexts

Social Science Quarterly (Blackwell Publishing Limited)

Biosocial development and delinquent involvement

Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice

General strain theory: Additional evidence using cross-cultural data

Criminology

A test of general strain theory

Criminology

The economics of absence: theory and evidence

Journal of Economic Surveys

The empirical status of strain theory

Journal of Crime and Justice

General strain theory and the relationship between early victimization and drug use

Deviant Behavior

Meta-analysis of the relationship between HIV infection and risk for depressive disorders

American Journal of Psychiatry

Delinquent Boys: The Culture of the Gang

Gender Differences in the Predictors of Juvenile Delinquency: Assessing the Generality-Specificity Debate

Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice

A Longitudinal Investigation of Sport Participation, Peer Acceptance, and Self-esteem among Adolescent Girls and Boys

Sex Roles

Words and deeds: social science and social policy

Social Problems

How do stressful family environments relate to reported access and use of health care by low-income children?

Medical Care Research and Review

Crime and physical health: Illness, injuries, accidents and offending in the Cambridge study

Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health

Pubertal development, social factors, and delinquency among adolescent boys

Criminology

Insurance status among people with AIDS: Relationships with sociodemographic characteristics and service use

Inquiry

Kids need friends: An examination of the relationships between language and motor deficits and peer rejection in primary school children

Australian Journal of Psychology

The dimensionality of stigma: A comparison of its impact on the self of persons with HIV/AIDS and cancer

Journal of Health & Social Behavior

Impacts of dental pain on daily activities of adolescents aged 14-15 years and their families

Acta Odontologica Scandinavica

A General Theory of Crime

The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health: Research Design