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Chapter 7

Chapter 7. Chapter. Conformity, Deviance, and Crime. Anthony Giddens Mitchell Duneier Richard P. Appelbaum. Fig. 7.1. The Study of Deviant Behavior. What Is Deviant Behavior? Norms are the do’s and don’ts of society Deviance is nonconformity to a set of norms

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Chapter 7

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  1. Chapter 7 Chapter Conformity, Deviance, and Crime Anthony Giddens Mitchell Duneier Richard P. Appelbaum

  2. Fig. 7.1

  3. The Study of Deviant Behavior • What Is Deviant Behavior? • Norms are the do’s and don’ts of society • Devianceis nonconformity to a set of norms • What’s considered deviant shifts from time to time • Normal behavior in one culture may be deviant in another • Most people are deviant sometimes

  4. The Study of Deviant Behavior • Norms and Sanctions • Sanctions are applied by society to reinforce social norms • Can be formal or informal • Lawsare norms defined and enforced by governments • Crimes are acts that break laws

  5. The Study of Deviant Behavior • The Biological View of Deviance • Theories that try to link biological factors with deviant behavior • Some studies link physical characteristics to delinquency • Aggression is connected to factors present at birth • No decisive evidence that any personality traits are inherited

  6. The Study of Deviant Behavior • The Psychological View of Deviance • Some crimes are associated with particular personality types • Traits associated with psychopaths don’t have to be negative or lead to crime • Though certain criminals possess abnormal personality traits, majority of criminals don’t

  7. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Functionalist Theories • See crime and deviance as produced by structural tensions and lack of moral regulation within society

  8. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Durkheim • Anomie refers to feeling of anxiety and disorientation that exists when no clear standards exist to guide behavior in social life • Regarded crime and deviance as inevitable and necessary to society • Deviance introduces new ideas, brings about change • Clarifies social norms

  9. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Merton • Modified anomie to include strain put on individuals when accepted norms conflict with social reality • These five types of individuals react to tensions between social values and the limited means to achieving them: • Conformistsaccept conventional means even if they are not successful • Innovators accept values but use illegitimate or illegal means to follow them

  10. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Merton (cont) • Ritualists conform but have lost sight of underlying values • Retreatists reject dominant values and means of achieving them • Rebels reject values and work to replace them with new ones

  11. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Interactionist Theories • Focus on deviance as socially constructed phenomenon • Edwin Sutherland linked crime to differential association—the concept that individuals become delinquent through associating with people who are carriers of criminal norms

  12. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Labeling Theory • Labeling theory assumes labeling someone as deviant will reinforce deviant behavior • Primary deviation: initial act of transgression • Secondary deviation: individual accepts the label and sees oneself as deviant • No act is intrinsically criminal (or normal) • Labeling theorists are interested in how behavior is defined as deviant and why certain groups, but not others, are labeled deviant

  13. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Conflict Theories • Conflict theories analyze crime and deviance in terms of structure of society, competing interests between social groups, and preservation of power among elites

  14. Society and Crime: Sociological Theories • Control Theories • Control theories posit that crime occurs when inadequate social or physical controls exist • Growth of crime linked to increasing opportunities and targets for crime in modern societies • Theory of broken windows suggests direct connection between appearance of disorder and actual crime

  15. Fig. 7.2 top

  16. Fig. 7.2 bottom

  17. Crime and Crime Statistics • Crime Surveys • Surveys like the National Crime Victimization Survey is one of main ways sociologists track crime trends • Many crimes (maybe half) are never reported • Crime rates have declined since their peak in early 1990s due to strong economy and declining crack market

  18. Fig. 7.3

  19. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Gender and Crime • Rates of criminality are much lower for women than for men • Socialization differences • Greater involvement of men in nondomestic spheres • Unemployment and crisis of masculinity linked to male crime rates

  20. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Gender and Crime (cont) • Women are overwhelmingly the victims of rape by men • Rape much more common than official stats show • All women are victims of rape because they live in fear and take special precautions for their protection

  21. Table 7.1

  22. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Crimes against Gays and Lesbians • Gays and lesbians experience high levels of criminal victimization and harassment • Because they are stigmatized, they are seen as “deserving” of crime rather than innocent victims

  23. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Youth and Crime • Popular fear about crime focuses on crimes committed by young, working-class males • Official statistics reveal high rates of crime among young people but we should be wary of moral panic about youth crime • Much deviant behavior among youth, such as anti-social behavior and nonconformity is not criminal

  24. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Crimes of the Powerful • White-collar crime refers to crime of affluent people • Efforts to detect are limited • Those caught rarely go to jail • Can affect more people than lower-class criminality

  25. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Crimes of the Powerful (cont) • Corporate crime describes offenses committed by large corporations • Many corporations to not adhere to legal regulations • Disadvantaged are disproportionately affected

  26. Victims and Perpetrators of Crime • Crimes of the Powerful (cont) • Organized Crime • Involves institutionalized form of criminal activity • Many characteristics of organizations appear orthodox, but activity is illegal • Cybercrime • Criminal activity carried out with help of information technology • Global reach of crime challenges law enforcement

  27. Fig. 7.4

  28. Crime-Reduction Strategies • Are Prisons the Answer? • Prisons developed in part to protect society and in part to reform criminal • Do not seem to deter crime • Degree to which they rehabilitate prisoners to face outside world without relapse is dubious • Policing • Can be reassuring to public • Sociologists argue now less about controlling crime and more about detecting and managing risks

  29. Fig. 7.5 left

  30. Fig. 7.5 right

  31. Crime-Reduction Strategies • Crime and Community • Rebuilding communities and preventing crime are closely linked • Community-based punishment is an alternative to prison

  32. Review Questions • 1. Which of the following people can be considered deviant? • someone who doesn’t put money in the parking meter • a person who chooses to live in an isolated area with no water, electricity, or other modern conveniences • a mentally ill person who has frequent outbursts and makes inappropriate comments in public • All of the above • None of the above

  33. Review Questions • 2. What is the irony of the relationship between deviance and a well-ordered society? • Most deviant behavior is learned through socially acceptable institutions such as schools, the family, and the media. • The more a society punishes deviance, the more the unaccepted behavior is repeated. • Deviance helps hold societies together by uniting people in opposition to behavior that is deemed unacceptable. • Definitions of deviance change over time thus frustrating society’s efforts to enact formal sanctions.

  34. Review Questions • 3. Anomie can be defined as ________. • a sense of disorientation or anxiousness that develops when there are no clear standards to guide behavior in a given area of social life • a mild form of depression brought on when a person loses his sense of self • a sort of paralysis that overcomes a whole community when levels of deviance have been steadily increasing • a sense of aimlessness or despair that develops when an individual is not well integrated into a community

  35. Review Questions • 4. A child struggles to learn how to read and is • frequently teased about it by his siblings and is • referred to as “slow” by his parents and teachers. • He underperforms in school and never thinks • about going to college. Ultimately he drops out • before graduating from high school, telling the • school counselor that he’s just not a smart guy • who can learn from books. This is an example of • which theory of deviance? • labeling theory • strain theory • reflection theory • role theory

  36. Review Questions • 5. According to some interactionist and conflict theorists, the way deviance is defined reveals a great deal about __________. • how social norms evolve over time • the strength of a society’s social capital • how much a society values conformity • power structures in society

  37. Review Questions • 6. What is paradoxical about the relationship between criminal behavior and prisons? • For some criminals, incarceration provides a way to make new contacts in the criminal world that will be useful when they are released. • The threat of a long prison sentence does not seem to act as a deterrent for most criminals. • Contrary to their stated purpose, prisons may actually reinforce deviant behavior rather than rehabilitating criminals and turning them away from a life of crime. • The longer a person is in prison, the more difficult it is to reintegrate him or her into society upon release.

  38. Review Questions • 7. In recent years there has been a significant shift in police work from _________ to _________. • focusing on violent crimes; community policing • relying more and more on technology; increasing the number of officers on the streets • preventing crime; building community resources • controlling crime; detecting and managing risk

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