labelling to explain crime Flashcards
1
Q
what is a stereotype?
A
- a simplistic generalisation about an individual group or situation often based on limited information
2
Q
what is prejudice?
A
- to pre-judge someone on the basis of their membership to a group/social category
- form an evaluation of them
3
Q
what is discrimination?
A
- a set of behaviours towards members of a categorised group which are unfair
4
Q
what is the process of labelling?
A
- a majority group considering a minority group as inferior and using inferior terms when talking about them
- can be negative or positive
5
Q
how does labelling link to stereotyping?
A
- usually someone’s stereotype of someone leads to a label
6
Q
what is a stigma?
A
- a powerful negative label that affects someone’s self concepts
7
Q
what is a selft concept?
A
- someone’s view of themselves which comes from the label given to you
8
Q
what are the 4 different types of labelling?
A
- retrospective labelling
- projective labelling
- informal labelling
- formal labelling
9
Q
give an example of each of the types of labelling
A
- retrospective = he was always bad
- projective = you’ll soon end up in prison
- informal = family members thinking of a person as a troublemaker
- formal = being arrested and processed
10
Q
how does the process of labelling lead to engaging in criminal behaviour?
A
- individual is publicly labelled as deviant which may lead to rejection from social groups
- this may encourage further deviance
- official treatment of deviance e.g. convicted criminals find it harder to get jobs
- deviant career may emerge
- master status reached overriding all other relationships outside the deviant group
11
Q
what is the study of livingston?
A
- looked at forensic labelling and the effect on self stigma
- quantitative findings = level of self stigma was significantly associated with psychiatric symptoms severity
- qualitative = access to high quality forensic mental health services increase risk of exposure and social stigma
12
Q
what is the supporting study of besemer et al?
A
- found that a convicted parent as well as poorer socioeconomic status such as low family income increase conviction risk
- supports labelling and specifically intergenerational labelling
13
Q
what was the study of farrington et al?
A
- for males the strongest predictor for crime = availability of reinforcement
- females = labelling particularly by parents
- increased violence offence rates by a factor of 19.2
14
Q
what is an application of labelling?
A
- reintergrative shaming = communicating shame about crime effectively
- criminal recieves support and is helped back into society from prison staff etc
15
Q
why is the theory reductionist?
A
- some people commit crime without being labelled e.g murderers
