Interactionism and labelling theory Flashcards
What makes an act deviant according to labelling theorists?
When society reacts to the crime
Moral entrepreneurs
Leaders of moral crusades to change the laws
What are two effects of new laws according to Becker?
Creating of law breakers
Expansion of social agents
Example of creation and impact of law
Victorian moral entrepreneurs lead to laws surrounding Truancy and sexual promiscuity which made more young people deviant
3 factors impacting arrest, charge and conviction
Appearance and personality
Interaction with social agent
Circumstance for arrest
What affects police decisions to arrest youths according to Piliavin and Briar?
Gender, ethnicity and class with time and location of ‘crime’
Typifications
The stereotypes social agents hold about deviants
How do typifications lead to class bias
Working class people fit the deviant stereotype
How is bias enforced by probation officers
Poverty and broken homes cause crime, so probation officers patrol working class areas.
Why is justice negotiated for middle class people?
They fit the typifications less and parents can negotiate based on monitoring and changing their deviant child’s behaviour
Why should we use OCS as a topic rather than resource
They are invalid and at face-value
Why are OCS socially constructed?
Choices on proceeding with conviction are made and are based on the label they attached to the deviant
What do statistics tell us?
Activities of prosecutors and police
Dark figure of crime
Crime that goes unreported, unrecognised and undetected; the crime rate doesn’t include this
Two types of statistics sociologists use to study crime
Victim surveys and self report surveys
Primary deviance
Crime and deviance that goes unreported and non-socially defined
Master status
Labelling excludes and stigmatises to become their only source of identity
Self-concept
The sense of identity
Self fulfilling prophecy
Internalising a label and acting it out
Secondary deviance
Deviance as a result of societies reaction
Deviant career
Reaction leads to seeking a label such as a subculture that supports deviance
Deviant subculture
Subcultures of crime and deviance norms
Control culture
Norms and values that control behaviour
Deviance amplification spiral
The idea that reporting deviance leads to deviance increasing
Cohens media and ‘folk devil’ study
Studied the media exaggerated impact on mods and rockers. Moral entrepreneurs called for a lockdown which social agents prosecuted them. Led to stigmatisation and isolating mods and rockers as ‘Folk devils’ and seeking refuge in deviant subcultures to fulfill a deviant career
Folk devils vs Dark figure
Folk devils - Overreported
Dark figure - Underreported
How have attempts to control and punish offenders had the opposite according to Triplett
Considered evil and had harsher punishments which leads to rebellion and higher crime rates such as Truancy
Why is labelling theory important to policy?
Suggests it pushes more into crime. Creating less laws = less crime
Disintegrative shaming
Offender and crime excluded
Reintegrative shaming
Act labelled as evil, offender not
Which shaming leads to less crime according to Brainwathe
Reintegrative shaming as they can reflect on how bad their crime was and not themselves. It allows less stigma and allows the re-joining of society rather than exclusion.
Describe Durkheims study into suicide.
Using OS, he studied suicide amongst Catholics and protestants and discovered causes of suicide based on effective society integration and behaviour regulation
How does Douglas view OS on suicide?
A social construct and only tell us about the activities based on who is constructing reports i.e. Coroners
How does death get labelled as suicide?
Interactions and negotiations between social actors i.e. Coroners and families
What data does Douglas suggest we use?
Qualitative data such as suicide notes, family interviews and suicide survivor interviews
Statistics of deaths in the UK 2018 vs 2023
6,507 suicides in the UK in 2018
115 people take their lives a week in the UK in 2023
What does Atkinson focus on relating to suicide?
The mode of suicide used
The time, location
Circumstance of death
How can Atkinson be evaluated?
Interpretative data and has no factual quality to it
What do interactionists say about OS?
A record of the activities of those who have the power to attach labels
Lemert paranoia study; master status
Individuals considered odd produce a reaction that labels them as mentally ill. They get sent to mental institutions and paranoid becomes their master status
Rosenhan’s study into pseudo patients
Researches admitted to hospitals as ‘hearing things.’ They were diagnosed as schizophrenic and treated like this, becoming their master status
Goffman asylum study; Mortification and degredation
Asylums involve Mortification which is killing your identity and degradation rituals such as confiscation which remove your identity and replace it with ‘the inmate’
How did people in the Asylums react to this? Two ways
Immediate conformity
Resistance and late conformity
Braginski et al manipulation study
Inmates manipulated status as being not well enough to be discharged but not sick enough to be kept. They gained free roam
Positive contribution of labelling theory?
Shows how discriminatory laws can be and how OS/OCs are the recorded activities
3 criticisms of labelling theory
Deterministic
Assumes deviants aren’t aware that their acts are deviant
Focuses on middle ground social agents rather than those who create laws i.e. Government
