Strain Theory

The criminological theory that best describes why individuals engage in this violent act is Strain Theory. Strain theory is that someone is being pressured into achieving accepted goals. Even though they may not have the means to do it, they are expected to achieve it. Strain Theory can lead to the lack of being able to achieve a goal, the loss of a loved one or friend, and negative stimuli that means being physically or verbally abused. These can all lead to a violent act because of all the pressure that is being put on them, they become so strained that they cannot handle it anymore. Sometimes people expect so much from someone and do not take the chance to really understand a person and what they can handle. Sometimes if a person loses someone
Such strains indicate the likelihood of crime, which include the harsh discipline of a parent and discrimination. Research says that these increase crime because of the emotional abuse in brings on someone. Sometimes research finds support for these strains but sometimes they do not. With strain theory, there is a likelihood of crime and it leads to negative conditions such as bullying, teasing, humiliating, and anything that has to do with verbal or physical abuse. There are two types of general strain theory, which is subjective and objective strain. Objective is events that are disliked within a given group. Subjective strain is events that are disliked by the person experiencing them. “As the larger stress literature demonstrates, individuals often differ in their subjective evaluation of the same objective strains. For example, some students are devastated by low grades, while others care little about their grades.” (Agnew 654). Sometimes grades affect students and if they get a bad grade when they put all their effort into it, these students do not understand why and think it is unfair. Strain can cause anything and especially if someone has so much work at school, family problems, or even problems with their peers it can cause them to act out. Some of these offenders have never committed a crime in their life and because of all the stress that they are getting they just cannot handle it. Bullying happens all the time and it is something we cannot stop because no matter what there will always be someone bullying another. Bullying is one cause of strain theory because if someone is being bullied for a long time they probably cannot handle