Soc 319: Sociological Approaches to Social Psychology Deviance & Labelling Theory Tuesday April 28 and Thursday April 30, 2009

I. What is Deviance A. Deviant behavior is behavior that violates the norms that apply in a given situation. 1. Two different views of deviance exist: a. Absolutist view of deviance b. Culturally relative view of deviance. i. Symbolic interactionists believe that deviance is socially constructed or culturally relative. 2. Where do these behavioral norms come from? a. “Local” and group norms. b. Subcultural norms are norms that apply to large numbers of individuals who share a given characteristic. c. Societal norms are the broad norms that are widely adhered to in a given society.

A. Anomie theory (Robert Merton) 1. Robert Merton argues that anomie is a discrepancy between socially engendered goals and the availability of legitimate means to achieve those goals. a. Legitimate means refers to the socially acceptable pathways for reaching a social acceptable goal. b. See chart of Merton’s typology. c. Merton’s typology emphasizes the different adaptations that people may make to the socially structured contradiction between cultural goals and means of attaining goals. d. Strengths of anomie theory It takes blame off of individual for deviant behavior, and recognizes that unfair distribution of resources is associated with deviant behavior.

Merton’s anomie/strain theory

Incarceration rates by ethnicity

B. Control theory (Hirschi) 1. The premise of control theory is that social ties or “social bonding” influence our tendency to engage in deviant behavior. 2. Social bonding has both inner and outer dimensions. 3. The inner dimension of social bonding is characterized by socialization into a set of conventional beliefs about how one should act.

B. Control theory (Hirschi) cont’d 4. Outer dimensions of social bonding may also operate as controls against deviant behavior. a. Attachment - This refers to the strength of a person’s ties to others, particularly to other persons who conform to society’s normative standard. b. Commitment. This refers to the degree to which a person is tied to conventional ways of behaving by virtue of the social rewards one obtains from acting in accordance with prevailing norms. c. Involvement - This refers to the proportion of a person’s time engaged in the pursuit of conventionality. 5. Empirical assessments. Sampson and Laub’s (1990) longitudinal study of 1,000 white males from childhood to age 32.

Age-Crime Curve

C. Differential Association 1. Argument: We learn deviant behavior the same way we learn conventional behavior. The extent to which we learn the behavior of others depends upon: a. the point in the life course when we interact with the group. Associations earlier in life are more important. b. the degree to which we are emotionally attached to the group c. we have more frequent and longer associations with group members

Recidivism, based on 15-state study

III. Labeling Theory A. What is labeling theory? 1. Labeling theory suggests that deviants are those people who have been successfully labeled as such by others. 2. Example: the power of a label – Rosenhan’s “on being sane in insane places” study. B. What is the labeling process? 1. The first step is “primary deviance” or the behavior that initially evokes the deviant identity. It is the initial act of “rule breaking.” 2. Simply applying the label of “deviant” to an individual may evoke in others a schema of beliefs about how the labeled person will behave. This process is referred to as secondary deviance. 3. Confirmation of the label: a. Others create a setting whereby the label is confirmed. b. The deviant’s may change due to their new stigmatized social status. c. The deviant might join a deviant subculture.

Labeling Theory (cont’d) IV. Differential reactions to “rule breaking” or deviance A. Whether or not this act is labeled as deviant often depends on the characteristics of the actor, the observer, and the context in which the behavior occurs. 1. Perceptual bias of control agents. a. Example: William Chambliss’ “Saints and “Roughnecks” study B. Implications 1. Uniform Crime Reports 2. Race, class and arrests

Not all crimes are reported. Few lead to arrest. What factor account for discrepancies?