Strain, Negative Emotion, Social Support, And Delinquency Among Chinese Underclass Criminals

Using a sample of 296 incarcerated man of china, this study analysis the characteristic of their strain,negative emotion and social support ,and clarify the effect of these factors on aggression behavior. Results show that:(1)The strain of underclass criminal contains 7 elements: unfair treating,life events,negative relationship with family,criminal victimization,negative relationship with wife,lack of money and negative interpersonal relationships. The most important one for them is unfair treating.(2)The level of strain for underclass criminal is higher than that of upper-class criminals; Strain is significantly different on the levels(styles)of age,marriage,education,negative emotion, social support and criminal behaviors.(3)The level of dissatisfied of underclass criminals is higher than that of upper-class criminals. Strain has positive effect on dissatisfied while social support has negative effect.(4)The level of social support,especially the object support of underclass criminals, is lower than that of upper-class criminals.(5) Strain is no positive effect on violent crime.(6)The dispositional anger is no positive effect on violent crime while the dissatisfied can increase the possibility of violent crime.(7) The social support mediates the relationship between strain and dissatisfied as well as the relationship between dissatisfied and violent crime.