وضعیت جرم رسمی و عزت نفس در میان جوانان چینی

The present study assessed an important hypothesis derived from the labeling perspective that official labeling of delinquency reduces self-esteem of the labeled individual. Although evidence for the hypothesis is rare in the U.S. research, it has been proposed that the relationship between official labeling and self-esteem may vary across different social and cultural contexts. China has a distinctive social and cultural setting and offers a unique opportunity to assess the hypothesis. It is argued that official labeling is likely to negatively affect self-esteem of the labeled youths in the social and cultural context of China. Using data collected from China, the study provided a preliminary test of the hypothesis. The findings support the hypothesis.

The purpose of this study was to apply the labeling perspective to analyzing the relationship between official offense status and self-esteem among Chinese youths. The labeling perspective hypothesizes that an important consequence of being officially labeled as deviant is the negative change of the labelee's self-esteem. Evidence for this hypothesis is rare in the U.S. Hepburn, 1977, Jensen, 1972 and Stager et al., 1983. An early study of delinquency and adolescent self-conceptions (Jensen, 1972) attempted to explore the relationship between official offense status and self-esteem among junior and senior high school students differentiated on the basis of race and status in Western Contra Costa County, California. The study did not show evidence for a relationship between official labeling and self-esteem in general, but it indicated that the relationship might be conditioned by sociocultural contexts such as race and status. The present study argued that Chinese society offered a distinctive social and cultural setting in a large scale for examining the relationship between official labeling and self-esteem. It provided a unique opportunity to assess the generalizability and applicability of labeling theory concerning the relationship in a different cultural context. Using data collected in Tianjin, a large city of China, the study attempted to provide a preliminary test of the relationship between official offense status and self-esteem among Chinese youths.

It is useful to present the correlation of variables used in the study before reporting the results of multivariate analysis (see Table 3 for a correlation matrix of the variables). As shown in Table 3, official offense status is significantly and negatively correlated with self-esteem (r=−.22). The measures of family deviance, neighborhood deviance, and friend deviance are also significantly associated with low self-esteem (r=−.08 for family deviance, −.16 for neighborhood deviance, and −.21 for friend deviance). Parental status has a modest and positive correlation with self-esteem (r=.09) and education is significantly and positively related to self-esteem (r=.13). As age increases, the level of self-esteem is likely to increase (r=.09). Table 3. Zero-order correlation matrix of variables Variables 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 1. Official offense status 1.00 2. Gender .15** 1.00 3. Parental status −.15** −.04 1.00 4. Age −.05 .14** −.09* 1.00 5. Education −.53** −.19** .14** .31** 1.00 6. Self-esteem −.22** −.11** .09* .09** .13** 1.00 7. Family deviance .26** .08* −.07 .01 −.17** −.08* 1.00 8. Neighborhood deviance .37** .19** −.10** .14** −.16** −.16** .25** 1.00 9. Friend deviance .57** .24** −.04 .02 −.33** −.21** .26** .42** 1.00 N=728. ** P<.01. * P<.05. Table options The results of multiple regression are reported in Table 4. The results show that official offense is an important variable affecting the level of self-esteem when other independent variables are controlled constant (β=−.12). Being officially labeled as delinquent is likely to have a negative effect on self-esteem among Chinese youths, which is consistent with the prediction derived from the labeling theory. Friend deviance, parental status, and age remain as other significant variables in explaining the level of self-esteem. Youths who had delinquent friends were likely to have low self-esteem (β=−.11). Higher parental status was associated with a higher level of self-esteem (β=.08) and older youths were likely to have a higher level of self-esteem than younger ones (β=.12). 4 Table 4. OLS regression of self-esteem on official offense status along with control variables Independent variable β t-ratio Official offense status −.12 −2.36* Gender −.07 −1.87 Parental status .08 2.20* Age .12 2.90** Education −.03 −0.57 Family deviance −.02 −0.55 Neighborhood deviance −.05 −1.28 Friend deviance −.11 −2.31* R2=.08, N=728. * P<.05. ** P<.01.