Merton's strain theory

Question 1

What are blocked opportunities?

Answer 1

Poverty and inadequate schools are blocking opportunities for working class people

Question 2

What is a ‘strain’?

Answer 2

the blocked opportunities create a ‘strain’ between the goal society says they should achieve and the lack of legitimate means to do so

Question 3

What is Conformists?

Answer 3

people who accept the goal and the ways to achieve it

Question 4

What is Innovation?

Answer 4

people who accept the goal but find illegal ways of achieving it by committing utilitarian crimes

Question 5

What is Ritualism?

Answer 5

people who give up striving for success, they plod along in a dead-end job

Question 6

What is Retreatism?

Answer 6

people who are dropouts who reject both goal and means

Question 7

What is Rebellion?

Answer 7

people who reject the existing goals and means, replacing them with new ones with the aim of changing society

Question 8

What are the strengths of this theory?

Answer 8

shows how both normal and deviant behaviour arise from the same goals e.g. conformists and innovators
explains the pattern shown in official statistics: most crime is property crime because society values wealth so highly

Question 9

What are the limitations of this theory?

Answer 9

ignores crimes of the wealthy and over-predicts the amount of working class crime, sees deviance solely as an individual response ignoring the group deviance of delinquent subcultures, focuses on utilitarian crime