C&D T2: Labelling Theory

Question 1

What’s different about labelling theory?

Answer 1

labelling theorists are interested in HOW & WHY certain acts and people are
LABELLED as deviant and what the consequences of this labelling may
have for any future actions.

Question 2

How are Functionalists ‘problem takers’?

Answer 2

They take for granted that official statistics are a true representation of real patterns of crime and who commits it. They seek to discover the causes of crime - therefore provide solutions

Question 3

What do labelling theorists (Interactionism) focus on?

Answer 3

Reaction and Definition of deviance rather than the causes

Question 4

What is a Moral Entrepreneur?

Answer 4

People who lead a ‘moral crusade’ to change the law in the belief that it will benefit those to whom it is applied.

Question 5

However, according to Becker invariably, there are two effects of a new law:

Answer 5

1. Outsiders are created - deviants who break the new rule
2. Creation/ expansion of a social control agency - Eg. police/ courts - they enforce rules and impose labels on offenders

Question 6

What factors cause people to get arrested/ charged?

Answer 6

• their interactions with agencies of social control
• their appearance, background and biography
• the situation and circumstances of the offence

Question 7

Piliavin and Briar

Answer 7

police decisions to arrest youth were mainly based on physical cues such as dress and manner.
Other factors such as class, gender, ethnicity, time/ place –> individuals ran a greater risk of arrest.

Question 8

CICOUREL and Typifications

Answer 8

common sense theories of what the typical delinquent is like - led them to concentrate on certain types of offenders

Question 9

What is the result of typifications?

Answer 9

Law enforcement showed class bias and in turn led to police patrolling areas more intensively

Question 10

Commonsense theory

Answer 10

juvenile delinquency was caused by broken
homes, poverty and poor parenting.

Question 11

What does the commonsense theory lead to?

Answer 11

Middle class youth arrest is less likely - as the background doesnt fit the ‘typical delinquent’
Middle class parents are more likely to negotiate successfully with the police

More likely to be counselled, warned and released rather than prosecuted

Question 12

Cicourel’s view on offical stats:

Answer 12

they should NOT be used as a resource as they dont represent FACTS about crime but rather they should be used as a topic for sociologists.
This will shed light on the activities of social control agencies in terms of how they process and label certain types of people as criminal

Question 13

Offical Statistics

Answer 13

a social construct - they only tell us about activities of the police rather than the amount of crime on society and those who commit it.

A dark figure of crime - difference between the official stats and the ‘real’ rate of crime. Sociologists use alternative stats such as those gathered from self reports studies and victim surveys to get a more realistic figure

Question 14

The effects of labelling

Answer 14

Lemert makes a distinction between two different types of deviance - each type has different consequences for those who are labelled

Question 15

Primary deviance

Answer 15

not publicly labelled and these acts will have little significance for the individuals status or self concept.

Question 16

Secondary Deviance

Answer 16

result of societal reaction - publicly caught and labelled as a criminal . They get stigmatised and excluded from normal society.

Question 17

Becker - Master status

Answer 17

this can provoke a crisis for the individuals self concept - to resolve this, they internalise the deviant label seeing themselves as the world - SFP

Question 18

Jock young an drug use in North London

Answer 18

Hippie marijuana users in Notting Hill
The drug was only a minimal part of the culture.
Labelling by the control culture led hippies to see themselves as outsiders

They essentially formed a deviant subculture
This prompted more attention from the police, creating secondary deviance - showing how social control agencies can create deviance

Question 19

Deviance amplification

Answer 19

when the attempt to control deviance leads to an increase in deviance

Question 20

Stan Cohen - folk devils and moral panics

Answer 20

A study of the societal reaction to the ‘mods and rockers’ during the 1960s
Illustrates the deviance amplification spiral

Question 21

How does this study illustrate the deviance amplification spiral?

Answer 21

Police exaggerated the events so a moral panic began
Police responded by arresting more youths - courts imposed harsher penalties

Question 22

Braithwait identifies a more positive role for the labelling process identifying the difference between types of shaming

Answer 22

Disintergrative shaming
Reintergrative shaming

Question 23

Disintergrative shaming

Answer 23

where both the crime and the individual is labelled as bad

Question 24

Reintergrative shaming

Answer 24

where just the act itself is labelled but the social actor is not.
The social actor is seen to have done a bad thing rather than being seen as a bad person.

Question 25

Why is Braithwaite’s approach more likely to avoid deviancy amplification?

Answer 25

Avoids the stigmatisation of the offender but makes them aware of their actions - encourages others to forgive and accept them. This makes it easier for the offender and community to separate the offence from the offender and re-admit the wrong doer back into society

Question 26

Mental Illness and suicide

Answer 26

Douglas took the interactionist approach.
He’s interested in the meaning that the act of suicide has for the deceased and in the way that coroners label death as suicide

Question 27

Atkinsons views on coroners

Answer 27

Atkinson agrees that official statistics are just a record of the labels that coroners attach, however he argues that we can never properly know the meanings individuals give to their suicides

Question 28

Institutionalisation

Answer 28

Goffman’s study show the effects of being admitted to a ‘total institution’