Sociology Chapter 7
Anomie
Durkheim's term for the loss of direction felt in a society when social control of individual behavior has become ineffective.
Anomie Theory of Deviance
Robert Merton's theory of deviance as an adaption of socially prescribed goals or of the means governing their attainment.
Conformity
Going along with peers--individuals of our own status who have no special right to direct our behavior.
Control Theory
A view of conformity and deviance that suggest that our connection to members of society leads us to systematically conform to society's norms.
Crime
A violation of criminal law for which some governmental authority applies formal penalties.
Cultural Transmission
A school of criminology that argues that criminal behavior is learned through social interactions.
Deviance
Behavior that violates the standards of conduct or expectations of a group or society.
Differential Association
A theory of deviance that holds that violation of rules results from exposure to attitudes favorable to criminal acts.
Differential Justice
Differences in the way social control is exercised over different groups.
Formal Social Control
Social control that is carried out by authorized agents, such as police officers, judges, school administrators, and employers.
Hate Crime
A criminal offense committed because of the offender's bias against a race, religion, ethnic group, national origin, or sexual orientation. Also reffered to as bias crime.
Index Crimes
The eight types of crime tabulated each year by the FBI in the Uniform Crime Reports: murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson.
Informal Social Control
Social control that is carried out casually by ordinary people through such means as laughter, smiles, and ridicule.
Labeling Theory
An approach to deviance that attempts to explain why certain people are viewed as deviants while others engaged in the same behavior are not.
Law
Governmental social control.
Obedince
Compliance with higher authorities in a hierarchical structure.
Organized Crime
The work of a group that regulates relations among criminal enterprises involved in illegal activities, including prostitution, gambling, and the smuggling and sale of illegal drugs.
Proffesional Criminal
A person who pursues crime as a day-to-day occupation, developing skilled techniques and enjoying a certain degree of status among other criminals.
Sanction
A penalty or reward for conduct concerning a social norm.
Social Disorganization Theory
The theory that crime and deviance are caused by the absence or breakdown of communal relationships and social institutions.
Social Constructionist Perspective
An approach to deviance that emphasizes the role of culture in the creation of the deviant identity.
Social Control
The techniques and strategies for preventing deviant human behavior in any society.
Societal-Reaction Approach
Another name for labeling theory.
Stigma
A label used to devalue members of certain social groups.
Transnational Crime
Crime that occurs across multiple national borders.
Victimless Crime
A term used by sociologists to describe the willing exchange among adults of widely desired but illegal goods and services.
Victimization Survey
A questionnaire or interview given to a sample of the population to determine whether people have been victims of crime.
White-Collar Crime
Illegal acts committed by affluent, "respectable" individuals in the course of business activities.
Society brings about acceptance of basic norms through techniques and strategies for preventing deviant behavior. This process is termed:
Social Control
Which sociological perspective argues that people must respect social norms if any group or society is to survive:
Functionalist perspective
Stanley Milgram used the word conformity to mean:
Going along with peers
Which sociological theory suggests that our connection to members of cavity leads us to conform systematically to society's norms:
Control theory
Which of the following statements is true of deviance:
Deviance is behavior that violates the standards of conduct or expectations of a group or society
Which sociologist illustrated the boundary-maintenance function of deviance in his study of Puritans in 17th-century New England:
Kai Erikson
Which one go the following is not one of the basic forms of adaption specified in Robert Merton's anomie theory of deviance:
hostility
Which sociologist first advanced the idea that an individual undergoes the same basic socialization process whether learning conforming or deviant acts:
Edwin Sutherland
Which of the following theories contends that criminal victimization increases when communal relationships and social institutions break down:
Social disorganization theory
Which of the following conducted observation research on two groups of high school males (the Saints and the Roughnecks) and concluded that social class played an important role in the varying fortunes of the two groups:
William Chambliss
If we fail to respect and obey social norms, we may face punishment through informal or formal :
sanctions
Police officers, judges, administrators, employers, military officers, and managers of movie theaters are all instruments of what kind of social control:
formal
Some norms are considered so important by a society that they are formalized into controlling people's behavior. They are called:
laws
The primary source of conformity and obedience, including obedience to law:
socialization
Is a state of formlessness that typically occurs during a period of profound social chance and disorder, such as a time of economic collapse:
anomie
Labeling theory is also called the approach:
societal-reaction
What kind of theorists view standards of defiant behavior as merely reflecting cultural norms, whereas conflict and labeling theorists point out that the most powerful groups in a society can shape laws and standards and determine who is (or is not) prosecuted as a criminal:
functionalist
Feminists contend that prostitution and some forms of pornography are not
victimless crimes
Daniel Bell used the term to describe the process during which leadership of organized crime was transferred from Irish Americans to Jewish Americans and later to Italian Americans and others:
ethnic succession
Consumer fraud, briber, and income tax evasion are considered this kind of crime.
white-collar