1 Introduction
Rules of behavior that guide people’s actions.
Norms
Includes piercings, scarification, extreme tattooing, and reconstructive and cosmetic surgery.
Body Modification
Much effort has gone into the ethical implications of researching human subjects, which can be quite complex when studying deviant behavior. Generally, the subject should be asked if he or she consents to participate and his or her confidentiality should be protected.
Ethics in Research
A state of normlessness where society fails to effectively regulate the expectations or behaviors of its members.
Anomie
Neighborhoods characterized by positive social interaction, trust, and a sense of community.
Social Cohesion
Observing behavior and reenacting modeled behavior in actuality or in play.
Imitation
The strongest norms because they are backed by official sanctions (or a formal response).
Laws
A subculture in which men are allowed and encouraged to take multiple wives.
Polygamy
An independent group that reviews research to protect human subjects from potential harms of the research.
Institutional Review Board
Robert Agnew’s version of strain theory; suggests that strain at the individual level may result from the failure to achieve valued goals and also from the presence of negative relations or stimuli.
General Strain Theory
Refers to a mixture of different races and ethnicities in a given area.
Racial/Ethnic Heterogeneity
Organization of society, often hierarchical, that affects how and why people interact and the outcomes of those interactions.
Social Structure
“Moral” norms that may generate outrage if broken.
Mores
A mark of deviance or disgrace; a negative label or perceived deviance often leads to stigma that may then reduce an individual’s life chances.
Stigma
Often considered the “gold standard” in research, experimental designs generally require subjects to be randomly assigned to a treatment or control condition.
Experiments
Perspective suggesting that socioeconomic inequality has a direct effect on community crime rates.
Relative Deprivation
A model of urban cities, generally consisting of and moving out from the central business district, the zone in transition, the zone of the working class, the residential zone, and the commuter zone.
Concentric Zones
Attitudes, values, orientations, rationalizations, and beliefs related to legal and moral codes of society.
Definitions
Any number of programs and policies geared at keeping individuals away from crime and deviance and on a conforming path.
Prevention Programs
Criminal and deviant acts committed by large corporations, powerful political organizations, and individuals with prestige and influence; may result in physical harm, financial harm, or moral harm.
Elite Deviance
Refers to public observation where the researcher does not let the human subjects under study know that he or she is a researcher and that they are being studied.
Covert Observation
From Cloward and Ohlin’s theory—these develop in poor neighborhoods where there is some level of organized crime and illegitimate opportunity for young people growing up in the area.
Criminal Subculture
Parents’ ability to control their children’s behavior through parent–child attachment, rules, supervision, and social support.
Parental Efficacy
A theory emphasizing the values, beliefs, rituals, and practices of societies that promote certain deviant behaviors. Related, subcultural explanations emphasize the values, beliefs, rituals, and practices of subgroups that distinguish them from the larger society.
Cultural Deviance Theory
The conception of deviance that critiques the existing social system that creates norms of oppression.
Generally thought to be of two types: (1) violating norms of what people are expected to look like and (2) physical incapacity or disability.
Physical Deviance
Refers to the process that a researcher uses to define how a concept is measured, observed, or manipulated in a study.
Operationalization
Obstacles on the road to conforming success—for example, lack of education, poor access to legitimate careers, and so on.
Structural Impediments
An individual’s ability to achieve specific goals.
Individual Efficacy
The balance of rewards and punishments (anticipated and/or actual) that follow from deviant behaviors.
Differential Reinforcement