Chapter 13

Question 1

Deviant careerkcareerk

Answer 1

The passage of an individual through the stages of one or more related deviant identities

Question 2

Labelling theory

Answer 2

How the social response to initial acts of deviance can move a person toward a deviant identity and career

Question 3

Differential association theory

Answer 3

How people learn to be criminals through interaction with other criminals and how they acquire a criminal identity

Question 4

Interactionist theory in criminology

Answer 4

• Centred on interchanges between people and the meanings of these interchanges
• Based on broader symbolic interactionism theory

Question 5

Three premises of symbolic interactionism

Answer 5

1. People act according to objects in their lives and the meanings those objects have for them
2. These meaning emerge from interactions among people
3. Meanings are applied and occasionally modified

Question 6

Why is labelling not accurate or fair?

Answer 6

• some deviants escape public attention
• some have not deviated but are labelled as such
• the label may be subject to negotiation between possibly deviant people and those who label them

Question 7

interactionist theory helps explain (3)

Answer 7

1. the establishment of moral rules
2. their application through labelling
3. the long-term consequences of these processes for deviants and for society

Question 8

deviant careers are influenced by…

Answer 8

contingencies and turning points, for example early delinquency, drug use, no job

Question 9

deviant careers are characterized by (3)

Answer 9

• a sense of continuity
• perception of increasing opportunities
• increased sophistication and possibly recognization by peers

Question 10

primary deviation

Answer 10

early in the career, the offender commits acts infrequently

Question 11

secondary deviation

Answer 11

deviance becomes a way of life, the individual has an affinity (innate or required) for the intended deviant act

Question 12

who drifts and a why?

Answer 12

young people, have little commitment to deviance

Question 13

Moral rhetorics

Answer 13

Claims and assertions used to justify ones deviant behaviour

• used to neutralize the stigma
• later bec1omes instrumental rhetoric

Question 14

How do moral entrepreneurs construct “claim/making activities” to convince people a threat exists?

Answer 14

1. Assert the existence of a situation involving human activity as a cause
2. Define it as an undesirable but amenable to correction
3. Stimulate public scrutiny of the situation

Question 15

Quasi theories

Answer 15

Not based on empirical evidence and often overly simplistic

Question 16

Master status

Answer 16

Secondary deviation, due to labelling

Question 17

Continuance commitment

Answer 17

Awareness of the impossibility to choose a non-criminal identity because of penalties in making the switch

• structural (from community)
• personal (from attitudes or sense of self)

Question 18

Reactions to commitment (2)

Answer 18

1. Self-enhancing (attached to lifestyle, not motivated to leave)
2. Self-degrading (redefine the values and penalties associated with the lifestyle and become attached to them)

Question 19

Two areas of intersctionist theories can be seen in the context of socialization into crime

Answer 19

1. The process of differential association

2. Acquisition of criminal identity

Question 20

Differential association theory (1-5)

Answer 20

1. People learn how to engage in crime
2. This learning comes about through interaction with others who have already learned criminal ways
3. This learning occurs in small face to face groups
4. What is learning is criminal technique, motives, attitudes and rationalization
5. Among criminals l, one important learned attitude is disregard for the community’s legal code

Question 21

Differential association theory (6-9)

Answer 21

6. One acquires this attitude by associating with those who hold it and not associating with those who don’t
7. Differential association with criminals and non-criminals vary in frequency, duration, priority and intensity
8. Learning criminal behaviour rests on the same principles as learning any other kind of behaviour
9. Criminal behaviour is a response to the same cultural needs and values as non/criminal behaviour

Question 22

Strengths of differential association theory

Answer 22

• points out the importance of learning criminal behaviour, motives, attitudes and techniques
• highlights the importance of ties to deviant peers

Question 23

Critiques of differential association theory

Answer 23

• Deviant motives and meanings are often gradually learned and tentatively applied and modified over time in interactions with both deviants and non-deviants
• Expressive reasons for committing crime (thrill and enjoyment) are ignored
• Key concepts are hard to operationalize
• -Such as the intensity and frequency of criminal associations

Question 24

Two sides to the process of labelling

Answer 24

1. It is based on a variety of criteria (e.g., appearance, actions, associates, location)
2. Community identification of people tends to be highly persuasive, even for deviants themselves

Question 25

Neo-Marxist Critique

Answer 25

• Fails to relate crime and other forms of deviance to the larger society
• • Does not take into consideration historical, political, and economic contexts
• Labelling theory fails to examine the division between powerful and powerless in society
• • It does not link power to concepts such as labelling, deviant career, and agents of social control

Question 26

The empiricist critique

Answer 26

• ignores non-labelled deviants
• labelling as a cause of deviance is inadequately conceptualized
• lacks testable hypothesis

Question 27

The ethno-methodological critique

Answer 27

• Labelling theory neglects the question: “How do people make sense of their social world?”
• Labelling theorists do not examine how labels are created
  Instead, they rely on official definitions of who is labelled

Question 28

implications

Answer 28

• Exposes the moral enterprise involved in deviance
• Highlights the damaging effects of the deviant label
• • Makes re-entry into the community problematic
• Deviant label is esp. damaging when applied to youth
• • Juvenile courts should be used for only serious cases
• Calls attention to the deviant career as a process that helps explain deviance beyond its initial causes
• • People should have opportunities to build strong side bets in “respectable” pursuits