How does labeling theory explain deviance

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List of Partners vendors. Share Flipboard Email. Ferri argued that anyone convicted of a crime should be detained for as long as possible. Classical thinkers accepted the legal definition of crime uncritically; crime is what the law says it is. A human universal is a trait, characteristic, or behavior that exists across cultures, regardless of the nuances of a given context.

A famous example of a universal is the incest taboo. Exempting a very small number of small communities, all human cultures have a taboo against incest in some form. As soon as criminals are marked as inhuman or unnatural, the public has license to think of an individual convicted of a crime as completely unlike the rest of society; a whole new range of punishments are authorized, including serious social stigmatization.

Italian School biological explanations have not resonated in criminal justice systems in America. However, some traces still exist. Now, the conversation about crime and biological explanations focuses more on the relationship between genetics and crime than the relationship between phenotypic features and crime.

Though the debate has mutated, a biological explanation for deviance and crime is still commonplace. Cesare Lombroso : Cesare Lombroso argued that criminality was a biological trait found in some human beings. In many ways, psychological theories of deviance mirror biological explanations, only with an added emphasis on brain function. Whereas historical biological explanations, such as those provided by the Italian School, used biological traits from the whole body e.

One case study of a psychological theory of deviance is the case of conduct disorder. Conduct disorder is a psychological disorder diagnosed in childhood that presents itself through a repetitive and persistent pattern of behavior in which the basic rights of others and major age-appropriate norms are violated.

This childhood disorder is often seen as the precursor to antisocial personality disorder. According the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders—IV the professional manual listing all medically recognized mental disorders and their symptoms , conduct disorder presents as aggressive and disrespectful behavior. Compared to normal controls, youth with early and adolescent onset of conduct disorder displayed reduced responses in the brain regions associated with antisocial behavior.

In addition, youth with conduct disorder demonstrated less responsiveness in the orbitofrontal regions of the brain during a stimulus-reinforcement and reward task. These psychological symptoms of conduct disorder, both in terms of neuroanatomy and neurotransmitter regulation, help to explain the explanatory link between psychology and crime.

Moreover, they demonstrate the increasingly fluid boundary between psychological and biological theories of deviance. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — IV : According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — IV, the professional manual listing all medically recognized mental disorders and their symptoms, conduct disorder presents as aggressive and disrespectful behavior.

Psychological theories of deviance do not necessarily have a biological element. Take, for example, the case of post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD. PTSD is frequently invoked in cases of child abuse, in which the psychological trauma of having been abused as a child can contribute to deviant behavior in the future. Other theorists, such as Sampson and Laub have examined labeling theory in the context of social bonding theory.

Social bonding theory, first developed by Travis Hirschi, asserts that people who have strong attachments to conventional society for example, involvement, investment, and belief are less likely to be deviant than those with weak bonds to conventional society Chriss, Sampson and Laub argue that being labeled as deviant can have a negative effect on creating ties to those who are non-deviant, inhibiting their social bonding and attachments to conventional society.

Labeling can lead to blocked opportunities, such as reduced education and instability in employment; and, the weak conventional ties resulting from this lack of opportunity can create a long-lasting effect on adult criminal behavior. When individuals have little social support from conventional society, they can turn to deviant groups, where having a deviant label is accepted. However, this can create rationalization, attitudes, and opportunities that make involvement in these groups a risk factor for further deviant behavior Bernburg, Krohn, and Rivera, This increased involvement in deviant groups stems from two factors.

Firstly, labeling can cause rejection from non-deviant peers. And secondly, labeling can cause a withdrawal from interactions with non-deviant peers, which can result from a deviant self-concept. Thus, those labeled as deviant would want to seek relationships with those who also have a deviant self-concept.

This is summed up by differential association theory Sutherland and Cressey, , which states that being able to associate and interact with deviant people more easily leads to the transference of deviant attitudes and behaviors between those in the group, leading to further deviance. Early studies about adolescents who have been labeled as deviant show that those adolescents are more likely to have subsequent deviant behavior into early adulthood Bernburg and Krohn, However, more inclusive reviews of studies that examine how formal labeling affects subsequent behavior show more mixed results.

Most studies found a positive correlation between formal labeling and subsequent deviant behavior, and a smaller but still substantial number found no effect Huizinga and Henry, Criticism in the s undermined the popularity of labeling theory. There was little consistent empirical evidence for labeling theory the evidence that did exist was methodologically flawed , and critics believed that labeling theory was vague, simplistic and ideologically motivated.

Notably, Paternoster and Iovanni argued that large portions of labeling research were methodologically flawed to the extent that it offered few conclusions for sociologists. This research was flawed for several reasons. Firstly, labeling theory research tended to use samples of individuals from biased sources, such as police records.

This means that this research tended to ignore the effects of there being some formal reaction versus there being no formal reaction to labeling Bernburg, The past 20 years have brought significant attempts to improve the methodology of labeling theory research.

Researchers, such as Matsueda , have clarified how labeling leads to deviance, particularly when this labeling is informa, and these findings have been more replicable than those in the past. In and , the Minneapolis Police Department conducted an experiment to determine the effect of arresting domestic violence suspects on subsequent behavior Sherman and Berk, This original research found that arresting suspected perpetrators of domestic violence had a deterrent effect. However, when several other cities replicated this experiment, they found that arresting domestic violence perpetrators actually resulted in significant increases in domestic violence Dunford, Huizinga, and Elliott, Noting this discrepancy, Sherman and Smith aimed to examine the effect of arrest for domestic violence on subsequent violence and found that arrest for domestic violence increased the likelihood for subsequent arrest for domestic violence, but only in cases where the perpetrator was unemployed.

However, when those who were arrested were employed, the arrest had a deterrent effect Bernburg, Those in economically depressed areas — places where perpetrators were less likely to be able to hold down a job — had less to lose by the conventional social tie of work, and recidivism with higher.

In a similar vein, recidivism was also higher among partners in unmarried couples than those in married couples, unrestricted by the conventional bond of marriage. Sherman and Smith, This finding — which implies that formal labeling only increases deviance in specific situations — is consistent with deterrence theory. Deterrence theory states that whether or not someone commits an act of deviance is determined largely by the costs and benefits of committing a crime versus the threat of punishment.

Before Matsueda , researchers saw delinquency in adolescents as a factor of self-esteem, with mixed results. Matsueda looked at adolescent delinquency through the lense of how parents and authorities labeledchildren and how these labels influenced the perception of self these adolescents have — symbolic interactionism. This is caused by a transaction, where someone projects themselves into the role of another and seeing if the behavior associated with that role suits their situation Mead, The delinquent adolescent misbehaves, the authority responds by treating the adolescent like someone who misbehaves, and the adolescent responds in turn by misbehaving again.

This approach to delinquency from the perspective of role-taking stems from Briar and Piliavin , who found that boys who are uncommitted to conventional structures for action can be incited into delinquency by other boys. Once labeled deviant it becomes hard to get rid of the label due to the fact that it becomes a part of our master status and thus influences the way people behave with those who have been labeled as deviant.

Moreover, it also affects the way we view our selves and has an impact on the self-identity, our self-concept, this is due to the fact that we often shape our opinions about our selves based on how others are viewing us.

We carry this label with us everywhere, for e. When further this person goes to apply for a job they will have to mention it in his application and will be judged to a large extent based on the same.