Labelling Theory Explanation - Research Paper Example

? Labeling Introduction Crime rates have been increasing rapidly across the United States. It is fairly apparent that efforts by criminal justice and social work agencies, as well as others in the community, have not stopped crime to the extent most of us would like. Those who get involved with the criminal justice system continue their illegal behavior as a result of this involvement. It is important to understand why certain youth persistently offend despite aggressive efforts by agents of the criminal justice system to stop them. While labeling theory is not as popular as it once was, it has not been completely discredited as a way to understand how social processes lead to deviant behavior. Labeling Theory & Who Labels Whom? Labeling theory argues that just observing the delinquent, or its characteristics, will not provide a whole image of deviance or crime. A complete picture has to include community/society responses to such incidents (Traub and Little 291). Labeling theory is used as a way to understand deviant behavior, including crime, as a consequence of social differentiation processes in which some of society's members are singled out, identified, and defined as deviant, while others are not (Traub and Little 289-295). The causal proposition of labeling theory is that the act of treating a person as a deviant, in itself, can lead to deviant behavior on the part of that person. The punishment of deviant behavior often has an ironic effect: efforts at social control lead to decreased control (Schur 10). Social definitions of deviance and their accompanying social sanctions somehow pressure labeled individuals into further deviant behaviors. Loosely speaking, a "label," or, a definition of a person as deviant, may be thought of as an independent variable, or, a cause of deviant behavior (Akers 121). The process by which a person is labeled as deviant may be summarized as follows. First, an act is deemed as deviant. Second, the person committing the act is deemed as deviant. And third, a moral condemnation is placed upon this person (Traub and Little 289). According to labeling theory, then, reactions to criminal behavior should be considered at least as important as the behavior itself, if not more. Labeling theory took a lesson from Kai Erikson (p. 11), who argued that the "social audience," not the individual, is the critical variable in studying deviance because it is the audience who decides which acts, or types of acts, deserve the deviant label. In their coverage of labeling theory, Traub and Little (p. 290) wrote "it is the definition of an individual's behavior as deviant, rather than the behavior itself, that can cause a marked change in status which transforms a person's conception of self and initiates the process of locking that person into a 'deviant career'." Thus, it is the community and authority figures such as the police, judges, teachers, parents, and psychiatrists, who label persons as "criminal," "delinquent," "bad kid," "mentally ill," "poor student," and so on. Consequences of Labeling Labeling theory argues that public deviant labeling can have a profound impact on the ability of the labeled person to participate in mainstream society. In one sense, this is an all-too-obvious observation. Societal sanctions have obnoxious effects for the offender of social norms. This assumption is central to the classic school in criminology, namely the deterrence approach to crime and punishment (Gennaro 196). This perspective argues that being caught and punished for a crime should decrease one's future rate of offending. Punished individuals should tend to desist from crime to avoid the pain of punishment in the future. However, in direct contrast to this traditional view, labeling theory points out that the ability of the individual to engage in rational decision-making is not the only relevant factor in determining the consequences of punishment. Labeling theory looks beyond individual-level processes and argues that social sanctions can transcend their immediately intended function, namely, to sanction or contain deviant behavior. In an early statement on the labeling perspective, Tannenbaum theory has termed the concept "dramatization of evil" to make this point (Quinn 14). When an act of deviance is publicly announced and defined as immoral, for example, as occurs during formal sanctions, the immorality of the act is highlighted, as well as that of the actor. The offender's public image has been changed into that of an immoral type of person. The notion of the permanency or the lingering of the deviant status is at the heart of labeling theory. When a person's social status becomes that of the social deviant, his or her social identity may be affected for a long time, even permanently. People continue to see the labeled person as a deviant or at least associate the person with the alleged traits of the deviant, even long after the social sanction has been applied. In one way or another, labeling scholars distinguish between "primary deviance" and "secondary deviance", to use Lemert' s original terminology. Deviance is primary when it consists of deviant episodes that are transitory and may have various causes and, most importantly, have not been defined as deviant by significant social agents. In contrast, deviant behavior is secondary when it becomes a "means of defense, attack, or adaptation to the overt and covert problems created by the societal reaction to primary deviation" (Lemert 17). Once deviant behavior is publicly defined as deviance, negative stereotypes about certain categories of social deviants, which exist in the culture, are triggered. Primary deviance leads to a more stable pattern of secondary deviance, due to the nature of societal reaction to the publicly labeled individual. While often referred to as a single theory, within the labeling perspective there are arguments that differed in important respects. Theorists have specified different processes through which deviant labeling affects life-outcomes, and particularly how labeling could influence involvement in subsequent deviant behavior. Some theorists have focused on how deviant labeling affects subsequent behavior through an altered self-concept, others emphasize that labeling alters the person's social structural position (Liska and Messner 1998). In the popular classic Outsiders, Howard Becker describes a structural labeling process. Becker points out that most people refrain from criminal deviance because they are aware that such activity can have negative consequences for their social status (p. 27). They have "staked too much on continuing to be normal to allow [themselves] to be swayed by unconventional impulses" (p. 27-28). However, when a person is caught and publicly labeled as a criminal deviant, he or she is placed in an entirely new status, namely, that of a public deviant. The public deviant is excluded from mainstream society and thus the person's "stake in conformity", to use the terms of traditional social control theory, are less than before. Deviant statuses have negative stereotypes associated with them. People are exposed to negative stereotypes in the mainstream culture through stories, rumor, books, and the media. A contemporary example is how "real TV" programs such as "Cops" and others underscore law-breakers as hopeless outcasts, portraying images of people with low self-control, often painfully stupid, but always of questionable character and deserving to be "put away." In a famous essay on the development of mental disorder, Scheff speculates that stereotyped imagery of mental disorder is learned in early childhood and constantly reinforced in mass media and everyday social discourse. Like Becker, Scheff emphasized the prevalence of negative stereotypes. For Scheff, stereotyped imagery of mental disorder is learned in early childhood and reaffirmed in ordinary social interaction (Scheff 314). People tend to react to the labeled person on the basis of the stereotypes that they have been exposed to. People often assume that deviants possess the undesirable traits allegedly associated with their status. Popular notions of criminality become defining features of people so labeled. In Becker's terms, the status of the deviant can become a "master status" for the person. Master status is a social status that tends to override all other statuses a person may have. A person that has been publicly labeled a deviant may find herself blocked from the conventional means of carrying on the routines of everyday life open to most people. He or she is often denied participation in conventional groups. In Goffman's terms, the person bears stigma, a "spoiled identity". The deviant label disqualifies the person from full social acceptance (Lloyd 316). Exclusion from conventional social life, in turn, can be a crucial step in building a stable pattern of deviant behavior, The deviant label can become a "self-fulfilling prophecy" (Becker 34). The labeled person is channeled into social roles that often entail or increase the likelihood of deviant behavior. The public knowledge of the rule infraction "sets in motion several mechanisms which conspire to shape the person in the image people have of him [or her] (p. 34). First, it may be that when blocked from legitimate opportunities, "the deviant must of necessity develop illegitimate routines" (p. 35). Second, since the person is detached from conventional groups he or she becomes more likely to associate with other deviants and deviant groups. The deviant group provides collective rationalization for the behavior and a deviant identity as well as training that facilitates the behavior (p. 38-39). Note that Becker does not assume that the label is necessarily forced upon "innocent" people. Rather, societal reaction, namely, the labeling of someone as a deviant, blocks participation in conventional groups, over and above the actual behavior that causes the labeling. The behavior itself and the forces that have brought it about may continue to have important impact on the future. But the social reaction process has consequences that transcend those factors that exist prior to the labeling event, for example, self identity, personality, social networks, and behavioral orientations. While Becker focuses on how the deviant label affects the socio-structural status of the person, other theorists have focused on how the deviant label gives rise to patterns of social interaction that can alter the self-identity of the labeled person. These theorists are often grounded in the tradition of symbolic interactionism where the primary focus of inquiry is the interaction order; the labeling process is the outcome of the negotiating interplay of individual and his or her ongoing symbolic interaction. One of the most systematic and compelling arguments for this approach is Scheff’s essay on the dynamics of mental disorders. In an attempt to cast light on the development of the stabilizing of mental disorder ("residual deviance"). Scheff states several propositions "which make up basic assumptions for a social system model of mental disorder" (p. 312). Like other labeling theorists, Scheff pointed out that episodes of deviance (mental disorder) probably have diverse sources, psychological as well as social. Only a small part of all cases of mental disorder in the population is formally treated as mental illness or defined as such. Most episodes of mental disorder are "transitory' mental disorder episodes that do not become a stable pattern for the individual. But under what circumstances do transitory episodes of mental disorder develop into a stable pattern of mental illness? Similar to Becker, Scheff believes that the answer is to be found in the public recognition of the deviant behavior and the association with stereotypes of insanity. However, rather than focusing on the abrupt change in social status. Scheff focuses on how the labeled person's self changes in ongoing symbolic interaction. Once the individual has been successfully defined as a mentally ill person, he or she will tend to conform to the stereotyped expectations of others. Conformity to the role of the mentally ill person is induced through subtle social learning processes of reward and punishment. Thus the labeled individual is rewarded for behaving in line with people's stereotypical expectations. Also, the individual is denied access to conventional roles. In short, once the individual has been labeled a deviant, the cultural stereotypes thus stabilize "primary deviance, and tend to produce uniformity in symptoms." Conclusion In conclusion, labeling theory argues that just observing the delinquent, or its characteristics, will not construct a whole image of deviance or crime. A complete picture has to include community responses to such incidents. It suggests that once an individual is labeled as being of a certain group, their behavior starts to reflect this label. Thus a self-fulfilling prophecy has ensued. This label has further effects on this individual as he or she is labeled a criminal. After repeatedly being categorized as a particular type of deviant, despite efforts to the contrary, the label becomes part of the individual's self-concept. This person is now more likely than others who do not carry this label to be arrested on suspicion of perpetrating additional crimes. Work Cited Akers, Ronald. "Labeling Theory," Pp. 121-138 in Criminological Theories: Introduction, Evaluation, and Application. Los Angeles: Roxbury. 2000. Becker. Howard. Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance. NY: Free Press. 1963. Erikson, Kai T. "Notes on the Sociology of Deviance," Pp. 9-21 in The Other Side: Perspectives on Deviance, edited by H. S. Becker. New York: The Free Press, 1964. Gennaro Vito, Jeffrey Maahs, Ronald Holmes. Criminology: theory, research, and policy. Jones & Bartlett Publishers, 2006. Lemert Edwin. Human Deviance, Social Problems and Social Control. Englewood Cliffs. N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1967.. Lloyd Barbara. “Safe sisters: limitations of sister city relationships for international peace building.” School of Sociology and Social Work, (2010). University of Tasmania. Quinn, Susan. “The Gang Member Label and Juvenile Justice Decision-Making,” Criminology and Criminal Justice, (2010), THE Florida State University. Scheff. Thomas H. Becoming Mentally III. Chicago: Aldine, 1966. Schur, Edwin. Labeling Deviant Behavior: Its Sociological Implications. New York: Harper and Row, 1971. Traub, Stuart H. and Craig B. Little. "Labeling and Deviance," Pp. 289-295 in Theories of Deviance, 4th Edition, edited by S. H. Traub and C. B. Little. Itasca, IL: F. E. Peacock Publishers, Inc. 1994. Read More