SS1 SOC 2024 Deviant Behavior
Quiz 3
Due Midnight 06/15/14
Instructions: Type your name at the top. Answer each question. Turn this back in as an attachment in
the quiz section. Do not pay much attention to style. You will be graded based solely on the answer you
provide. You may use only your book or powerpoint from the week unless stated otherwise in a
question.
Time Limit: 45 Minutes
1) It was revealed to the school that you stole from the Rite Aid on University Blvd. Someone who
knows you posted a photo of you with the caption “THIEF” all over campus. What actually
happened was you accidentally forgot to pay for an item. Explain how this might lead to a selffulfilling prophecy where you start committing crimes despite the fact that you were innocent?
4pts
Since the person who knew me labeled me as deviant and I may believe I am a deviant
person because of the photo, I become more likely to engage in deviant behavior. I may then
join deviant groups and commit crimes I may have not if I had not been labeled as a deviant
individual. Even if it was an accident and I am an innocent person, I may conform to my new
deviant status and let a self-fulfilling prophecy take hold of me because of this secondary
deviance.
2) In the same example, say you really were a full-fledged shoplifter and you came to accept this
role. You did it because you are a single parent and make very little money to support your twochildren. Basically this is primary deviance. Using the sequence of interaction leading to
secondary deviation explain how this primary deviance turns into secondary deviance. 8pts
This primary deviance becomes secondary deviance once societal reaction is involved. If
there is no labeling or stigma placed on me than it is only primary but once I am “defined” and it
affects my identity and how I view myself that can then transform into secondary deviance.
Once societal penalties, reactions, further deviation, crisis, and stigmatizing are involved
secondary deviance arises. The ultimate acceptance of ones deviant social status must occur
before it can be deemed secondary. Life then becomes organized around deviance. Secondary
deviance “occurs when the individual who enacts deviant behavior deals with the problems
created by social reactions to his or her primary deviations” (Goode 53).
3) What is the difference between primary and secondary deviance? 2 pts
Primary deviance occurs before secondary deviance. Primary deviance is “polygenic,
arising out of a variety of social, cultural, psychological, and physiological factors” whereas
secondary deviance “involves the process of societal reaction”. Secondary deviance is very much
influenced by labeling and/or stigma, but these factors take no part in primary deviance.
Primary deviation is polygenetic.
4) What about the Saints and the Roughnecks applies to labeling theory? 6pts
The Saints and the Roughnecks were two very deviant groups at the same high school.
However, the community labeled these two groups very differently. The reactions toward the
Roughnecks were much more severe and negative than those toward the Saints. The deviant
label placed on the individuals within the Roughnecks at such a young age greatly influenced
their deviant behavior and status into adulthood.