Sociological Theories in Deviance

Sociological Theories in Deviance

• Subcultural Theory suggests that deviance arises from whole groups breaking away from mainstream society, forming subcultures with deviant values.
• Individuals in subcultures conform to the norms and values of their specific group, contributing to deviance.
• Subcultural theory emphasizes the influence of peer groups in promoting deviance, contrasting with social control theories which focus on the lack of social bonds.
• Status Frustration emerges within deviant subcultures due to a sense of personal failure and inadequacy.
• Albert Cohen argued that working-class boys strive for middle-class values and aspirations but lack the means to achieve them, resulting in status frustration.
• Working-class boys respond to status frustration by rejecting mainstream values and behaviors, forming delinquent subcultures that reverse societal norms.
• Cloward and Ohlin's Subcultural Theory further expands on Cohen's theory, exploring the development of specific subcultures within varying social circumstances.
• Cloward and Ohlin introduced the concept of "illegitimate opportunity structure," which impacts the type of subculture that emerges.
• They proposed three types of delinquent subcultures:
  • Criminal Subcultures: Provides opportunities for engaging in organized crime
  • Conflict Subcultures: Emerges in areas with weak social organization, where violence is a means of achieving status.
  • Retreatist Subcultures: Individuals who cannot participate in either criminal or conflict subcultures and retreat into drug use, alcohol abuse, or other escape mechanisms.

Retreatism

• Individuals reject cultural goals and the means to achieve them.
• They do not replace these norms with their own counter-cultural forces.
• Examples include severe alcoholics, some homeless people, and hermits.

Rebellion

• Individuals reject cultural goals and means but work on something to replace them.
• They substitute new goals and new means of attaining those goals to bring about revolutionary change and create a new society.
• Examples include the American Nazi party, "skinheads," "hippies," and the Ku Klux Klan.

Differential Association

• Theory developed by Edwin Sutherland (1883–1950).
• Individuals learn values, attitudes, techniques, and motives for criminal behavior through interaction with others.
• Focuses on how individuals learn to become criminals, not why they become criminals.
• Predicts that an individual will choose a criminal path when the balance of definitions for law-breaking exceeds those for law-abiding.
• The earlier in life an individual comes under the influence of high-status people within a group, the more likely the individual is to follow in their footsteps.

Two Types of Social Control by Kimbell Young

• Positive social control: rewards and incentives have value on a person's activities.
  • People desire to be rewarded by society.
  • They follow societal mores, practices, and traditions to achieve this.
  • Examples include rewards, fame, respect, and recognition.
• Negative social control: uses the threat of punishment to prevent an individual from doing something wrong.
  • Prevents people from violating socially accepted traditions, customs, ideas, and values.
  • Examples include verbal punishment, defamation, and negative criticism.

Travis Hirschi's Control Theory (Social Bonds)

• Criminal activity occurs when an individual’s attachment to society is weakened.
• This attachment depends on the strength of social bonds that hold people to society.
• Four social bonds hold people together: attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief.
• The theory predicts that the ‘typical delinquent’ is young, single, unemployed, and probably male.
• Conversely, those who are married and in work are less likely to commit a crime.

Deterrence Theory

• People don't commit crimes because they are afraid of getting caught, not because of a deep moral sense.
• People are more likely to be dissuaded from crime if they fear punishment.