Exam 1 Flashcards
define deviant behaviour
basically anyone not perfect
General Categories of deviance (7)
1) Crime–> murder drug dealing etc
2) Mental disorders
3) Sexual deviance
4) Substance abuse
5) Physical disorders
6) Suicide–> not a crime in many jurisdictions (Canada)
7) etc.., impoliteness; divorced etc
5 Definitions of deviance (LIST)
1) statistical
2) Absolutist
3) Reactivist
4) Normative
5) Legalist
Statistical Definition and 2 problems
A) behaviour/condition that is NOT the majority or average (concrete and clear definition (deviates from mean (avg), median (midpoint) and mode (most score ppl got)
Problem 1: overly inclusive= makes eveyone deviant
Problem 2: most ppl determine deviance according to what it should be not what it is… cant relate wearing glasses to a mental illness
Absolutist Definition 3 problems
any aberration from an absolute set of standards of conduct…(standards imposed by religious or psychiatric authority ie) Sin is deviant and DM4 psych bible (to look up to see if someone is in the boundary or out)
P1: almost always disagreement over absolute standards…. (among religions many differences.. also so many versions of the bible)
P2: even if one standard is absolutely true= doesn’t tell us anything about the social organization if deviants
P3: absolute truth in the hands of a tiny minority would be odd to charge that all non- followers are deviant
Reactivist Definitions and problems
-Howard Becker: deviant is the individual who is labelled successfully
-labelling theory: people are deviant because they are named deviant (mental ppl health act)
thats why children arent labelled as criminals in the news because they will behave like criminals
-deviant= is somebody who has been labelled
P1: asserts that unobserved behaviour cant be deviant–> observe yourself torturing cats–> self labelling (is never important)
P2: asserts that the label deviance has nothing to do with the behaviour per se but only the process of defining something as deviant …falsely accused criminals that are falsely accused
-ie) alferd plea: had a guilty plea–> but didnt do it=so the state cant be sued—> so basically are official murderers
Normative Definition
whats a norm?
criticisms (1)
deviance is a violation of a norm, a socially shared standard of conduct (some come from religion most don’t)
norms: social properties that suggest what persons should/shouldn’t do as well as what behaviours are normal in certain situations
P1: norm is an inheritantly vague and relativistic concept (hard to talk about deviance without talking about norms
Legalist Definition
-concrete benchmark for a normative view of deviance: deviance is an act that breaks the law
P1: not all deviant acts are illegal: a lot of things that are not illegal ie) alcoholism definitely a deviant act and not all illegal acts are deviant
P2: not all illegal acts are deviant: traffic violations arent always bad sometimes have to for safely
-stealing food to feed family
most popular sociological definition of deviance
Normative Definition
sociologist is going to offer two definitions of deviance
Reactivist and Normative
Norm vs rule
norm isnt a rule
-rules are imposed by those in power and are not socially shared
whereas norms are socially accepted ideas
SES stands for
socio economic structure
definition SES
- weather someone is wealthy or not
- poor vs rich kids: kinds of crimes that are normative- wealthy crime is going to be like business crimes- not going to sell crack
- wealthy ppl have the means to do so (commit more crime) but caught much less because police is busy survellencing the poor ppl
SES and deviant labls
- provides for the differential application of deviant labels
- substance abuse more used by poorer ppl are going to be arrestes and convicted BUT wealthy ppl their addictions may not be noticed IF they are… treated meddically (sent to rehab)
Do norms vary with SES
yes the expectations for normative behaviour is going to differ btw poor and wealthy ppl
Gender related deviance
- the violation of gender roles
- ie)men most trivial and serious deviants more likely to commit violent crimes
- females more likely to engage in less serious self abuse, eating disorder (self destructive) and non serious crimes related to the economy such as shoplifting
- man: mass murderer= deviant for committing a violent act but also not deviant because we expect a male to commit a violent crime
- women mass murderer: even more deviant because a female committed a violent crime
is it easy or hard to quantify deviance
difficult
Sources of Response bias (6)
a) MISTRUST IN OFFICICAL REPS
b) SOCIAL DESIRABILITY BIAS: ppl will give you socially accepted answers but not the truth
c) FINANCIAL MOTIVATION: getting ppl to do the surveys is by giving them money–> some respondents doing the survey over and over again
d)DIFFICULTY IN FINDING RESPONDANTS: difficult to qunatify noncriminal deviances –> murder you have the dead body so you know ut happened
corp crime (almost never reported)
-due to lack of contact info (no directory of drug users/ prosititutes)
-decentralization of deviants= difficult to find deviants because they are scattered everywhere
E)WARINESS OF FUNDING SOURCES: national study of sexual behaviour rejected by federal govt bc asking population personal questions
F) respondants misunderstanding survey instruments
Methods of Data collection for quantifying deviance and crime (LIST)
A) UNIFORM CRIMINAL REPORTS (UCR)
B) VICTIMIZATION SURVEYS
C) SELF-REPORT SURVEYS
UNIFORM CRIMINAL REPORTS (UCR)
ADV AND DIS
A) predominant; official stats; police gathered; national in scope; Stats CPS and rural RCMP; used by stats CANADA not the public–> police have to know about the crimes reported to SC
B) DISAD: low rates of reporting; ppl dont call in their victimization; lower for theft under 5000 then sexual assault; 100% police awareness besides murder is car theft; can be flaws in police reporting
C) ADV: consistency; legal professional one criminal code that their following; tells us what police know and what they found doesnt tell us how much crime their is;
VICTIMIZATION SURVEYS
ADV AND DISADV
A) asks respondents have you been a victim of crime and did you report it?; crime study done more than once a yr;
B)ADV: uncover unreported crimes and reporting rates; high completion rate in the US (35000 respondants–> very successful victims want to share their experiences–US ones a month Canada biyearly
C)DISADV: not a national scope in Canada; we dont have a huge comprehension; relies on the victims memory and interpretation; dont ask victims which crime
jail vs prison
jail: is a remand centre; pretrial is less than 1 year
prison: more than 1 year after conviction
distinction btw: burglary larceny theft
-all property crime Canada serious: over 1000 and less than 1000 less dangerous) and robbery (violent crime–> threatening with a weapon
SELF-REPORT SURVEYS
ADV AND DISADV
A) in principle: most effective way of tabulating crime–> including victimless and white-collar crimes but lots of practical problems
B) DISADV: relying on ppls reports; will underreport and some will over report; some ppl will want to appear as as a harder case to the person talking the survey
