1. Chapter 6
Deviance and Crime

2. Chapter Outline The Social Definition of Deviance and Crime
Explaining Deviance and Crime
Trends in Criminal Justice

3. Crime in the United States
There are roughly 2 million people in state and federal prisons and local jails.
This number is increasing by 50,000 to 80,000 per year.
The U.S. has more people behind bars than any other country on Earth.
Over 12% more people are behind bars in the U.S. than in China and India combined.

4. Polling Question
Do favor or oppose a 7-day waiting period before handgun purchases?
Favor
Oppose
Don't know

5. The Social Definition of Deviance and Crime
Susan B. Anthony and Martin Luther King, Jr., were considered deviant and criminal.
Susan B. Anthony was arrested and fined for voting.
Martin Luther King, Jr. was repeatedly arrested for marching for African-Americans’ civil rights.

6. Deviance Deviance involves breaking a norm.
Crime is deviance that is against the law.
Informal punishment may involve raised eyebrows, gossip, ostracism, “shaming,” or stigmatization.
Formal punishment results from people breaking laws, which are norms enforced by government bodies.

7. Classifying Deviance: John Hagan
Three dimensions:
Severity of the social response.
Perceived harmfulness of the act.
Degree of public agreement about whether an act should be considered deviant.

8. Deviance and Crime

9. Hagan: Types of Deviance
Social diversions are minor, harmless acts.
Social deviations are more serious, somewhat harmful acts.

10. Hagan: Types of Deviance
Conflict crimes are deviant acts defined by the state as illegal, but the definition is controversial in the wider society.
Consensus crimes are widely recognized to be bad in themselves.

11. Crimes Against Women
Until recently, many crimes against women were largely ignored.
Rape is still associated with a low rate of prosecution, but is prosecuted more often than it used to be.
Sexual harassment is now considered a social deviation and in some circumstances, a crime.

12. White-Collar Crime
Includes embezzlement, false advertising, tax evasion, insider stock trading, and fraud.
In the 1980’s
Armed robbers netted about $400 million.
The savings and loan scandal cost the American public $500 to $600 billion.

13. White-Collar Crime Reasons for few convictions:
Often takes place in private and is difficult to detect.
Corporations can afford legal experts, public relations firms, and advertising agencies that advise their clients on how to bend laws, build up their corporate image, and influence lawmakers to pass laws “without teeth”.

14. % Population Victimized in Preceding 12 Months

15. Problems with Crime Statistics
Many assaults go unreported because the assailant is a friend or relative.
Many rape victims are reluctant to report the crime because they’re afraid they’ll be stigmatized.
Many crimes are not in crime indexes published by the FBI (prostitution and illegal drug use).
Most white-collar crimes are excluded from crime indexes.

16. Violent Crime

17. Property Crime

18. Crime Rates On average every hour during 2002: 2 murders 11 rapes
72 robberies
102 aggravated assaults
142 motor vehicle thefts
245 burglaries
800 larceny-thefts

19. Decline in Crime Rate: Factors
In the 1990s, governments put more police on the streets and many communities established patrol systems.
Young men are most prone to street crime and the proportion of young men in the population has declined.
The economy boomed in the 1990s, when fewer people have jobs, more crime occurs.

20. Decline in Crime Rate: Factors
Some researchers noted the decline in crime started 19 years after abortion was legalized in the United States.
In 1992 the population included proportionately fewer unwanted children.
Unwanted children are more crime prone than wanted children because they tend to receive less parental supervision and guidance.

21. Abortions and Crime

22. Criminal Profiles
77% of all persons arrested in the United States in 2002 were men.
In the violent crime category, men accounted for 83% of arrests.
In 2001 Americans under the age of 40 accounted for 80% of arrests.
Those 15- to 19-years-old age cohort is the most crime prone.

23. Criminal Profiles: Race
In 2002, African Americans accounted for 26.9% of arrests but composed only 12.3% of the population.
Three factors:
Bias in collection of crime statistics.
Low class position of blacks in American society.
Racial discrimination in the criminal justice system.

24. Polling Question
Have you ever been arrested?
Yes No

25. Arrests by Age, 2001 Age Cohort % of Population % of Arrests Under 10
14.0
0.2
10-14
7.3
5.1
15-19
7.1
21.2
20-24
6.8
19.4
25-29
12.3
30-34
7.2
11.2
35-39
8.2
10.9
40-44
8.1
8.9

26. Arrests by Race, 2001 Racial Group % of Population Arrests White 75.1
70.7
Black
12.3
26.9
American Indian and Alaskan Native
0.9
1.3
Asian and Pacific Islander
3.7
1.1

27. Deviance and Crime Theories
Motivational theories identify social factors that drive people to commit deviance and crime.
Constraint theories identify social factors that impose deviance and crime (or conventional behavior) on people.

28. Durkheim’s Functional Approach
According to Durkheim, deviance gives people the opportunity to define what is moral and what is not.
Our reactions to deviance clarify moral boundaries, allowing us to draw the line between right and wrong.
This promotes the unity of society and encourages healthy social change.

29. Strain Theory: Merton
Argued that cultures often teach people to value material success.
However, societies do not provide enough legitimate opportunities for everyone to succeed.
Therefore, some people experience strain.
Most will adhere to social norms.
The rest adapt.

30. Institutionalized means
Strain Theory
Institutionalized means
Accept
Reject
Create New
Cultural Goals
conformity
innovation
ritualism
retreatism
rebellion

31. Subcultural Theory
Argues that gangs are a collective adaptation to social conditions.
Distinct norms and values that reject the legitimate world crystallize in gangs.

32. Features of Criminal Subcultures
Delinquent youths may turn to different types of crime.
The availability of different subcultures influences the type of criminal activity to which one turns.

33. Features of Criminal Subcultures
Members justify their criminal activities.
Illegal activities appear normal to the members of the subculture.
Enables criminals to clear their consciences and get on with the job.

34. Theory of Differential Association
A person learns to favor one adaptation over another as a result of life experiences or socialization.
Everyone is exposed to deviant and nondeviant values and behaviors as they grow up.
If you are exposed to more deviant than nondeviant experiences, chances are you will learn to become a deviant.

35. Labeling Theory: A Symbolic Interactionist Approach
Deviance results not so much from the actions of the deviant as from the response of others, who label the rule breaker a deviant.
Master status: One’s overriding public identity:

36. Control theory The rewards of deviance and crime are many.
Nearly everyone would engage in deviance and crime if they could get away with it.
System of social control: Sanctions in society by means of which conformity to cultural guidelines is ensured.

37. Conflict Theories of Deviance and Crime
The powerful impose deviant and criminal labels on less powerful members of society.
Meanwhile, they are usually able to use their money and influence to escape punishment for their own misdeeds.

38. Theories of Deviance and Crime
Motivational Theories
Theory
Sociologist
Strain Theory
Merton
Subcultural Theory
Cohen, Cloward, Ohlin
Learning Theory
Sutherland

39. Theories of Deviance and Crime
Constraint Theories
Theory
Sociologist
Labeling Theory
Becker, Matsueda, Cicourel
Control Theory
Hirschi and Gottfredson
Conflict Theory
Spitzer

40. Goals of Incarceration
In 1966, 77% of Americans believed the main goal of prison was to rehabilitate prisoners.
In 1994 only 16% held that opinion.

41. Polling Question
What do you feel should be the most important function of prison?
Punish people for crimes they have committed.
Rehabilitate people who have committed crimes.
Protect society by locking away criminals from the rest of us.
Serve as a warning to would-be lawbreakers.
Make people pay back society for the crimes they have committed.

42. Belief in Capital Punishment: % “for”

43. Moral Panic
Between the early 1970s and the present the U.S. was gripped by moral panic.
The government declared a war on drugs, imprisoning hundreds of thousands of nonviolent offenders.
Many states passed a “three strikes” law to put three-time violent offenders in prison for life.
Support for capital punishment grew from 38% to 80% between 1965 and 1994.

45. Capital Punishment: A Questionable Deterrent
Murder is often committed in a rage.
More than 20,000 murders take place in the United States every year.
Only about 250 death sentences are handed out.
A murderer has a 1.25% chance of being sentenced to death.

46. Capital Punishment
A typical execution costs the taxpayer up to 6 times more than a 40-year stay in a maximum-security prison.
Nearly 40% of death sentences since 1977 have been overturned because of new evidence or mistrial.

47. Quick Quiz

48. Sociologist John Hagan classifies types of deviance and crime along which of the following dimensions?
severity of the social response
perceived harmfulness of the act
degree of public agreement about whether the act should be considered criminal or deviant
all of these choices

49. Answer: d
Sociologist John Hagan classifies various types of deviance and crime along the following dimensions:
the severity of the social response
the perceived harmfulness of the deviant or criminal act
the degree of public agreement about whether the act should be considered criminal or deviant.

50. 2. Which of the following behaviors is not considered a white-collar crime?
embezzlement
burglary
tax evasion
insider stock trading
copyright infringement

51. Answer: b
Burglary is not considered a white-collar crime.

52. 3. Crime statistics underestimate the actual incidence of crime because:
many criminal acts are not reported to the police
self-report surveys target only perpetrators not victims
many crimes are not incorporated into major crime indexes
many criminal acts are not reported to the police, and many crimes are not incorporated into major crime indexes

53. Answer: d
Crime statistics underestimate the actual incidence of crime because many criminal acts are not reported to the police, and crimes are not incorporated into major crime indexes.

54. 4. Most sociologists agree that the disproportionately high arrest, conviction, and incarceration rates of African Americans are due to:
community policing in ghettoes
low class position of blacks in society
racial discrimination in the criminal justice system
the low class position of blacks in American society, and racial discrimination in the criminal justice system

55. Answer: d
Most sociologists agree that the disproportionately high arrest, conviction, and incarceration rates of African Americans are due to the low class position of blacks in American society, and racial discrimination in the criminal justice system.

56. 5. Strain theory explains crime and deviance in terms of:
the lack of legitimate opportunities to achieve material success
exposure to more deviant than non-deviant values during socialization
the responses of others who define some actions as deviant and others as normal
the imposition of labels by the rich and powerful on the less powerful

57. Answer: a
Strain theory explains crime and deviance in terms of the lack of legitimate opportunities to achieve material success.

58. 6. The theory of differential association explains crime and deviance in terms of:
the lack of legitimate opportunities to achieve material success
criminal subcultures that collectively adapt to social conditions and reject mainstream values
exposure to more deviant than non-deviant values and behaviors during the socialization process
the responses of others who define some actions as deviant and others as normal

59. Answer: c
The theory of differential association explains crime and deviance in terms of exposure to more deviant than non-deviant values and behaviors during the socialization process.

60. 7. The view that deviance results not just from the action of the deviant but also from the responses of others is known as:
labeling theory
strain theory
the theory of differential association
subcultural theory
control theory

61. Answer: a
The view that deviance results not just from the action of the deviant but also from the responses of others is known as labeling theory.

62. 8. Which of the following are regarded as a function of prisons?
rehabilitation
deterrence
revenge
incapacitation
all of these choices

63. Answer: e
Rehabilitation, deterrence, revenge, and incapacitation are regarded as a function of prisons.