Chapter 6 Flashcards
Troubling youth
Troubling youth are primarily seen as threats to society. Those involved in crime and those who are members of gangs.
Troubled youth
Troubled youth are seen as threats to themselves and have the potential to become threats to society if their problems are not solved early enough
Youth culture
Youth culture and this period in the life cycle itself is deemed to be deviant and in need of social control. The concept of youth is socially constructed: some define it as an age, a social status, or a process.
Gap for youth
A gap exists between popular images of youth crimes and gangs and their actual prevalence and nature.
Five elements of moral panic
¬ heightened concern, hostility toward the offending group, a certain level of consensus that there is a real threat, disproportionality, and volatility.
o Used to explain the gap between the perceptions and patterns of youth crime
o Moral panics are constructed within the media, wherein youth crime is overrepresented, portrayed as a new problem for society, and linked to certain ethnic groups and classes.
Theories of deviance on the objective-subjective continuum used to explain youth crime
o Learning deviant techniques and motives from peers (differential association theory)
o Bonds with others that restrain most of us from crime (social bonds theory)
o Structural inequalities in access to legitimate opportunities (Merton’s strain theory) and Illegitimate opportunities (differential opportunity theory)
o And the system of rewards, punishments, and role models we have been exposed to in life (social learning theory)
What are youth more likely to engage in
¬ Youth are more likely to be involved with street gangs that gangs associated with organized crime and likely to be criminally active before joining. Memberships in gangs is fluid, ranges of age and diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds. There is a greater risk of gang involvement among youth who experience high levels of marginalization
Strain theory
¬ Underlying proposition of strain theories is that gangs will emerge in socially and economically disadvantaged communities where legitimate opportunities to achieve social status and economic success are limited. Gangs form as an alternative way of achieving status, social acceptance, and economic success (Merton’s strain theory)
Status frustration theory
¬ suggests that lower-class boys if unable to live up to the middle-class measuring rod that pervades the education system, would join with other similar boys in forming gangs that engage in expressive, destructive, non-utilitarian behaviours rather than economically driven activities.
Differential opportunity theory
¬ proposes that the nature of the illegitimate opportunities present in the community determines the nature of gang behaviour
Marxist perspective (subjective theory)
¬ youth gangs as sources of identity and expressions of resistance among youth who are structurally marginalized
Ethnographic research
¬ : involves researches embedding themselves in gangs for extended periods of time, interviewing gang members, and observing their daily activities.
People join gangs for what is in their best interest at the time, this can include
o Material incentives—an environment that improves chances of making money. Less effort individually than pursuing economic success individually. Financial security for themselves and their families during rough times.
o Recreation—provide entertainment and a social life, in some places the main social institution in the neighborhood.
o Place of refuge and camouflage—be just “one of the gang”, provides a level of anonymity, removes personal responsibility for illegal activities.
o Physical protection
o Time to resist—don’t want to live the lives their parents had. Rejection to society, a rejection the type of lives being offered.
o Commitment to the community—joining to continue the tradition.
Multiple levels of social control for street gangs
o Formal level: schools have gang awareness programs to prevent children from joining gangs:
o Retroactive and preventative programs: community agencies have both. Retroactive programs to try and persuade existing gang members to leave that lifestyle. Preventative programs sometimes operate in conjunction with schools to teach young children basic life skills or provide organized community activities
-Government provides gang-related legislation and social programs (ex, job training)
o Informal social controls occur at the level of everyday social interaction, typically focusing on preventative efforts (parenting efforts, community involvement with neighborhood children.
¬ Individual factors that influence whether substance use becomes problematic include the following: genetic and environmental predispositions, degree of personal competence, connection with violent behaviour, and gang involvement.
o Community factors include: norms about substance use, prevalence of crime, price, and availability of substances, economic conditions, and nature of peers.
o Family factors include: parenting style, degree of parent-child emotional attachment, and family history in relation to substance use play significant roles.
o School factors include: academic success, reading skills, problem-solving abilities, participation in extracurricular activities, and feelings of belonging influence the nature and extent of drug use.
