Chapter 6 Social Structure Theory

Question 1

What are the different elements of the U.S social strcture?

Question 2

Describe the association between social structure and crime.

Question 3

What are the elements of social disorganzation theory?

Question 4

What are the views of Shaw?

Question 5

What are the views of McKay?

Question 6

What are the various elements of ecological theory?

Question 7

What is the association between collective efficacy and crime?

Question 8

What does the term anomie mean?

Question 9

What is the concept of negative affective stress.

Question 10

Discuss the elements of cultural deviance theory.

Question 11

Stratified society

Answer 11

People grouped according to economic or social class; characterized by the unequal distribution of wealth, power and prestige.

Question 12

Discuss the concept of strain.

Answer 12

the anger , fustration and resnetment eperienced by people who believe thay cannot achieve their goals through legitimae means.

Question 13

Social class

Answer 13

segment of the population whose members are at the relatively similar economic level and who share attitudes, value, norms, and an identifiable lifestyle

Question 14

Social structure theory

Answer 14

the root cause of crime can be found in the nation’s socioeconomic makeup

root cause of crime can be traced directly to the socioeconomic disadvantages that have become embedded in american society.

the view that disagvantage economic class posotion is a primary cause of crime.

Question 15

Culture of poverty

Answer 15

a separate lower class culture characterized by apthy, cynicism, helplessness, and mistrust of social institutions such as school, goverment agencies, and the police, that is passed from one generation to the next.

Question 16

Underclass

Answer 16

the lowest social stratum in any country, whose members lack the education and skills needed to function successfully in modern society

Question 17

What are the problems of the lower class?

Answer 17

Oscar Lewis argued that the mistrust caused by the culture of poverty prevents the inner city poor from taking advantage of the meager opprtunities available to them.

Gunnar Myrdal described by the underclass.

Lower class area are sences of inadequate housing and health care, disrpted family lives, underemployment and despair.

More prone to depression,less likely to have achievement motivatin and less likely to put off immediate gratification fro the sake of future gain or security.

Less willing to stay in school because the rewards for educational achievement are in the distant future.

Question 18

What are the problems of child poverty?

Answer 18

Children have a higher poverty rate than any other age group

children who grow up in low income homes are less likely to achieve in school and less likely to complete their schooling than children with more affluent parents

More likely to suffer from health problems and to receive inadaquate health care

Question 19

What are the problems of minority group poverty?

Answer 19

minorities do not have the the protections and privileges of european.

unemployment

more likely to be proscted

less likely to finish school

unemployment and nontraditional family structure, may prevent them from developing the skills and habits that lead first to edcational success andlater the work place; these deficits have been linked to crime and drug abuse.

Question 20

How are the social problems of the lower class like an epidemic?

Answer 20

the problems of the lower class spread like and contagious disease ,destroying the inner worksingd that enable neighborhoods to survive; they become hollowed out.

crime and violence may take the form of a slow epidemic with a course consisting of stages; onset ,peak,decline. spreading likea contagious disease.

Question 21

Social structure theorists

Answer 21

criminologists who view membership in a disadcantage economic class as a primary cause of crime

Question 22

Social struture theories

Answer 22

suggest that social and economic forces operating in deteriorated lower class areas push many of their residents into criminal behavior patterns.

view unsupervised teenager gangs, high crime rates and scoial disorder in poor inner city areas as major social problems

social forces must infuence or control behavior because crime rates are higher in lower class urban centers than in middle class suburbs

encompasses three independent yet overlapping branches:social disorganization theory, strain theory and cultural deviance theory

Question 23

Social disorganization theory

Answer 23

branch of social struture theory that focuses on the breakdown in inner ciry neighbothood of institutions such as the family, school , and employment.

ficuses on the urban conditions that affect crime rates

indicators of soical disoragnization include high unemplyment and school dropout rates, deteriorated housing, low income levels and large number of single aprent households.

antisocial behavior flurishes as a result ofconflict and despair

Question 24

Stain theory

Answer 24

holds that crime is a function of the conflict bewteen peoples goals and the means thhey can use to obtain them.

argue that although socaial and econnmic goals are common to people in all economic strata, the abilty to obtain these goals is clss dependent.

Question 25

Cultural deviance theory

Answer 25

combines the elements of both strain and social disordganization theories.

because strain and social isolation, a unique lower class culture develops in disorganized neighborhoods. these independent subcultures maintain unique values and beliefs that conflicts with conventional socail norms. criminal beavior is an expression of conforminity to lower class sub-cultural values and traditions, not rebellion from conventional society. subcultural values are handed down from one generation to the next via cultural transmission.

Question 26

subculture

Answer 26

a set of values ,beliefs and traditons unique to a particular social class or group within a larger society.

Question 27

cultural transmission

Answer 27

process whereby values, beliefs, and traditions are handed down from one gerneration to the next

Question 28

Gang formation

Answer 28

gangs are a common feature in these disorganized areas