Crime and Deviance - Definitions

Question 1

Social control

Answer 1

Social control refers to the various methods used to persuade or force individuals to conform to the dominant social norms and values of a society or group

Question 2

Deviance

Answer 2

Deviance refers to rule-breaking behaviour of some kind, which fails to conform to the norms and expectations of a particular society or social group

Question 3

Crime

Answer 3

Crime is the term used to describe behaviour which is against the criminal law - law-breaking

Question 4

Societal deviance

Answer 4

Societal deviance refers to acts which are seen by most members of a society as deviant

Question 5

Situational deviance

Answer 5

Situational deviance refers to acts which are only defined as deviant in particular contexts

Question 6

White-collar crime

Answer 6

White-collar crime refers to offences committed by middle-class individuals who abuse their work positions for personal gain at the expense of the organisation or its clients

Question 7

Corporate crime

Answer 7

Corporate crime refers to offences committed by groups or individuals on behalf of large companies, which directly profit the company rather than individuals

Question 8

Delinquency

Answer 8

Delinquency is crime committed by those under age 18, though the term delinquency is often used to describe any anti-social or deviant activity by young people, even if it isn’t criminal

Question 9

Status frustration

Answer 9

Status frustration is a sense of frustration arising in individuals or groups because they feel they are denied status in society

Question 10

Techniques of neutralisation

Answer 10

Techniques of neutralisation are justifications used to excuse acts of crime and deviance, such as by denying responsibility, denying that there was a victim or any injury to a victim, claiming that those casting blame had no right to do so, or the deviance was justified by the circumstances

Question 11

Social exclusion

Answer 11

Social exclusion is where people are excluded from full participation in education, work, community life, access to services and other aspects of life seen as part of being a full and participating member of mainstream society

Question 12

Hegemony

Answer 12

Hegemony describes the dominance in society of the ruling class’s set of ideas over others, and acceptance of and consent to them by the rest of society

Question 13

Moral panic

Answer 13

A moral panic is a wave of public concern about some exaggerated or imaginary threat to society, stirred up by overblown and sensationalised reporting in the media

Question 14

Moral entrepreneur

Answer 14

A moral entrepreneur is a person, group or organisation with the power to create or enforce rules and impose their definitions of deviance

Question 15

Primary deviance

Answer 15

Primary deviance is deviance that has not been publicly labelled as such

Question 16

Secondary deviance

Answer 16

Secondary deviance is deviance that follows once a person has been publicly labelled as deviant

Question 17

Master status

Answer 17

A master status is one which displaces all other features of a person’s social standing, and a person is judged solely in terms of that one defining characteristic

Question 18

Deviant career

Answer 18

A deviant career is what arises when people who have been labelled as deviant find conventional opportunities blocked to them, and so are pushed into committing further deviant acts

Question 19

Marginality

Answer 19

Marginality is where some people are pushed to the margins or edges of society by poverty, lack of education, disability, racism and so on, and face social exclusion

Question 20

Hate crimes

Answer 20

Hate crimes are those which are perceived by the victim or any other person to be motivated by hostility or prejudice based on a person’s ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or disability

Question 21

Indictable offences

Answer 21

Indictable offences are more serious criminal offences that can be tried at the Crown Court or at the magistrates’ court

These contrast with less serious Summary Offences, such as motoring offences, common assault and small-scale criminal damage up to £5,000, which are usually tried only by a magistrates’ court

Question 22

Institutional racism

Answer 22

Institutional racism refers to patterns of discrimination based on ethnicity that have become structured into social institutions

Question 23

Hegemonic Masculinity

Answer 23

A hegemonic masculinity is a male gender identity that defines what is involved in being a real man, and is so dominant that those who don’t conform to it are seen as odd or abnormal in some way

Question 24

Agenda-setting

Answer 24

Agenda-setting involves the power to manage which issues are to be presented for public discussion and debates and which issues are to be kept in the background

Question 25

News values

Answer 25

News values are the values and assumptions held by editors and journalists which guide them in choosing what is newsworthy - what to report and what to leave out, and how what they choose to report should be presented

Question 26

Folk devils

Answer 26

Folk devils are individuals or groups posing an imagined or exaggerated threat to society

Question 27

Deviancy amplification

Answer 27

Deviancy amplification is the way the media may actually make worse or create the very deviance they condemn by their exaggerated, sensationalised and distorted reporting of events and their presence at them

Question 28

Restorative justice

Answer 28

Restorative justice is a process which brings together victims of crime and the offenders responsible, usually in face-to-face meetings, to help repair the harm done, restore the dignity and self-respect of victims, reduce their fear of crime, and make offenders take responsibility for the consequences of their actions

Question 29

Victimology

Answer 29

Victimology is the term used for the study of the impact of crime on victims, victims’ interests, and patterns of victimisation