Maltreatment and Delinquency in China: Examining and Extending the Intervening Process of General Strain Theory

Using a sample of 1,163 adolescents from four middle schools in China, this study explores the intervening process of how adolescent maltreatment is related to delinquency within the framework of general strain theory (GST) by comparing two models. The first model is Agnew's integrated model of GST, which examines the mediating effects of social control, delinquent peer affiliation, state anger, and depression on the relationship between maltreatment and delinquency. Based on this model, with the intent to further explore the mediating effects of state anger and depression and to investigate whether their effects on delinquency can be demonstrated more through delinquent peer affiliation and social control, an extended model (Model 2) is proposed by the authors. The second model relates state anger to delinquent peer affiliation and state depression to social control. By comparing the fit indices and the significance of the hypothesized paths of the two models, the study found that the extended model can better reflect the mechanism of how maltreatment contributes to delinquency, whereas the original integrated GST model only receives partial support because of its failure to find the mediating effects of state negative emotions.