1. Introduction
As an international student, I have always been interested in how behavior deviates across
different societies. This interest was solidified through the semester when we did readings such
as “Working at Bazooms” by Loe and “Fraternities and Collegiate Rape Culture” by Boswell and
Spade. It was very thought-provoking to try and use the social imagination to understand how
much of the concepts in these readings were due to America’s culture and how situations may
differ globally. The first place I conducted my research was in the American Sociological
Review. I searched ‘Deviance’ because I did not know what I wanted to do. A broad search
would allow me to find various diverging results. What I got back were many results that were
dated before the 2000s. These were too old to use, so I decided to try and search on the Colgate
Libraries search engine. I found a good review article, so I checked its bibliography. I repeated
this, leading to a process where I checked the bibliography of each relevant source, writing down
their names in a google document file. After making this file, I omitted all the files that were not
research articles. I also ensured they were not too dated. I placed each source that I had into a
separate word document. Then, I repeated the process of going through the bibliographies with
each of these sources. At this point, I had quite a few sources but no way to connect them
explicitly. I started to read the sources more in-depth and see what connections I could draw
between them. After reading my sources, I could see a direct link between them all. My topical
question is: What do sociologists know about deviance in different contexts?
2. Literature Review
Before explaining how deviance may diverge in different contexts, it is important to understand
how it is defined by different sociologists. It is important to note that deviance doesn’t only refer
to criminal behavior. Kobayashi et al. simply refer to deviance as “risky and challenging”
behaviors, as well as explain how deviance can be seen in more environments than just crime,
such as “marriage” and the “labor force” (Kobayashi, Sharp and Grasmick 2008:415). Curry and
Piquero (2003) also second these views, referring to Tittle (1995-1997). They address two types
of deviance, and how they can differ from one another. “Repressive deviance” refers to “direct
predatory acts… [and] defiance of laws and norms.” Meanwhile, autonomous deviance refers to
more “white-collar crimes”, which refers to crimes that may not directly harm a person (Tittle,
1995, as cited in Curry and Piquero, 2003). Deviance must be clearly defined for these studies as
there is a seeming lack of consensus amongst sociologists’ definitions of the word.
In their respective studies, Kobayashi, Sharp, and Grasmick (2008) as well as Curry and Piquero
(2003) utilize quantitative data in their studies. Kobayashi et. al (2008) explore how deviance
differed between men and women in Japan and the US (environmental causes), while Curry and
Piquero (2003) choose to look at how internal factors i.e., control ratios may affect levels of
deviance in modern society. To reach their conclusions, Kobayashi et. al (2008) took data from
two identical surveys (barring language) that had been conducted in Japanese and US
universities. These two surveys had been conducted as part of a bigger cross-cultural study
between America and the US. A total of 433 Japanese and 369 American questionnaires were
accepted into the study. Each question on the survey had a scale from 1 (never) to 5 (almost
always), and from these results, the mean and standard deviation results could be found for men
and women in both countries. Control variables were identified and kept constant throughout,
with the main variables changing being gender, and the conditional variable being culture.
Evidence found from these surveys supported the claim that “males engage in significantly
higher levels of deviance than females (Kobayashi, Sharp, and Grasmick 2008:430).”
However, Curry and Piquero’s research goes at odds with the findings of Kobayashi et al.’s
research. They explored the “Control Balance Theory” (Tittle 1995, as cited in Curry and
Piquero, 2003), a concept that Tittle hypothesized but never conducted research on. These
sociologists also conducted a survey, but the findings they were researching were different.
Instead of looking for differences in deviance when gender and culture change, they wanted to
find if there were any differences in deviance when a person’s control ratio changes (Curry and
Piquero, 2003). A Control Ratio (CR) is balanced at 1.0, and as the CR strays further from this
value, people have a greater disposition to perform deviant behaviors. To record defiant
deviance, participants were given an open response format where they wrote down the number of
times, they had gotten drunk or used marijuana in the 6 months preceding the interview.
Participants were also given a definition of control to read, before completing a questionnaire
pertaining to the amount of control, they think they would have in certain situations. The sum of
these could be divided by the number of questions to create each ppts. individual CR level. It
was found that “gender, race/ethnicity… are not associated with deviance.” (Curry and Piquero,
2003: 407).
Continuing the idea of gender, Hay (2003) explored the idea of deviance stemming from
families. Hay conducted a study under the concept of Robert Agnew’s “General Strain Theory”,
which focused on family-related strains faced by teens and young adults and how it may impact
their propensity to commit acts of deviance (Hay, 2003). He also took the approach of using
results from an already completed study to collect his data: “[the data was] … part of a broader
project dealing with family-related causes of deviancy (Hay, 2003: 114).” Interestingly though,
Hay opts to look at self-reported projected future deviancy. Kobayashi et al., as well as Curry and
Piquero (2003), used self-reported past deviancy in their studies. Hay states that there is an
“inherent casual problem (Hay, 2003: 116)”, where current ideals are used to explain past
behaviors. This can end up in skewed results: if you use your current ideologies to explain your
past actions, you inadvertently will see things in a different light. Hay eliminates this issue by
making participants think about what deviant acts they may commit in the context of their
current ideals. The other sources did not consider this, which means a vital variable has gone
unnoticed. Hay used a questionnaire that laid out 7 deviant acts of differing severities and used a
scale of 1 (never) to 10 (definitely) as an answering scale. Hay found that there was only one
correlation between family discipline and deviance: physical punishment, a family strain most
likely to lead to deviancy, is experienced at significantly higher levels by males (Hay, 2003).
Kelly, Vuolo, and Marin (2017) took a different approach to the other sources. They wanted to
explore the influence peer effects can have on deviance. Instead of basing their study on
pre-collected data, they decided to have their own screening process to find data to use.
Furthermore, these sociologists were the only ones to use qualitative data as well as quantitative
data to support their findings. Firstly, they used a time-space sampling method to recruit
venue-based samples from a list of generated ‘night-life scenes’ (Kelly et al., 2017: 4). This
method allowed for a random sample to be found in a controlled space. After gaining a sample of
participants who had abused prescription drugs, they were screened by software to determine
eligibility (9.4%). Of these, 77.4% (or 404 people) decided to go through with the study (Kelly et
al., 2017: 5). Kelly et al. (2017) wanted to measure the number of drug abuse in the last 90 days,
escalation of intake to non-oral methods, and symptoms of drug dependence. Kelly et al. also
conducted qualitative interviews to draw out ‘specific event narratives’ (Kelly et al., 2017: 6)
about drug misuse practices. These sociologists found that deviant acts in the context of drug
misuse were amplified when being around peers, as there was a larger social pressure to fit in, as
well as easier access to the drugs themselves (Kelly et al., 2017). It was interesting to see how
this source was one of only a few that directly studied the effects of peers on deviant acts,
especially in today’s age where social pressures are at their highest point. Tools like social media
amplify the desire to want to belong, yet I could not find any research about that.
Overall, there seems to be one overarching consensus that I found through my sources: Men are
more likely to deviate than women (Curry and Piquero, 2003), (Kobayashi, Sharp, and Grasmick
2008). The only source that explicitly disagreed with this was Hay (2003). It also interests me
how many sources have different explanations as to why this phenomenon may be, but there isn’t
much overlap between these studies. In trying to isolate a single variable, it is as if they neglect
the fact that many factors work in tandem to bring about certain situations.
3. Future Research
I am interested in whether the socioeconomic class of a given sample would have an impact on
levels of different types of deviance. My research would include 300 students, all of whom
would be in one of three class sectors. The average median income in America today is $70,181
(as of 2019). By extrapolation, we can estimate the top and bottom 33 percent of household
incomes ($46787.33, $93574.67). Then, I would create two questionnaires. One would discuss
past and future projected acts of autonomous deviancy, and the other would discuss past and
future projected acts of regressive deviancy (combining Hay and Kobayashi’s studies). I would
then use a regression model to find the mean level of deviancy in each of the classes I established
and find the standard deviance from this point. By doing this, I think I could find some
interesting results. I would like to see if the results that the previous studies had found could be
due to causation instead of a correlation and if the combination of their hypotheses would lead to
different results.
4. Bibliography
Curry, Theodore R., and Alex R. Piquero. 2003. “Control Ratios And Defiant Acts Of Deviance:
Assessing Additive And Conditional Effects With Constraints And Impulsivity.” Sociological
Perspectives 46(3): 397-415. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/sop.2003.46.3.397
Kobayashi, Emiko, Susan F. Sharp, and Harold G. Grasmick. 2008. “Gender and Deviance: A
Comparison of College Students in Japan and the United States.” Deviant Behavior
29(5):413–39. doi: 10.1080/01900690701598010
Kelly, Brian C., Mike Vuolo, and Alexandra C Marin. 2017. “Multiple Dimensions of Peer
Effects and Deviance: The Case of Prescription Drug Misuse among Young Adults.” Socius:
Sociological research for a Dynamic World 3(1):1-18. doi: 10.1177/2378023117706819
Hay, Carter. 2003. “Family Strain and Delinquency.” Sociological Perspectives 46(1):107-135.
doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/sop.2003.46.1.107
Rubric for SRP #3: Final Write Up
Formatting (15%)
1600-1700 words (5%)
5
Writing is clear, precise, grammatically correct and free of typos (10%)
9
-minimal low level errors, you right very well!
Introduction (15%)
Literature Review (30%)
Reflection on research process is thoughtful (7%)
7
Topical question is clear and well-considered (8%)
8
Student has studied sources carefully (10%)
10
Discussion is organized thematically (10%)
9
-moving in a good direction; the central theme seems to only arise at the end (regarding
gender)
Scholarly conversation is presented clearly (10%)
8
-great that this begins by defining deviance; review of studies are not always as clear as they
might be
Future Research (25%)
Future research is thoughtful (5%), feasible (5%), and sociologically significant (5%): 15%
12
-this is far too short to treat future research adequately–what is the larger sociological
question being posed?
Methods and data proposed are appropriate (10%)
7
-this has some good ideas but many basics are not reviewed; questionnaires seem a very flawed
way to get at future acts, as well as potentially limited in getting at previous ones (the
sociological principle of desirability bias means that people do not wish to be honest about
aspects of themselves they find morally suspect, and people’s memories are notoriously
inaccurate); moreover, the class categories do not make sense, even if we presume that
income=class which our readings this semester demonstrate to be false
Bibliography (15%)
Sources are appropriate/well-selected (10%) 8
-need to establish why the Kobayashi source is sociology as not on approved journals list
Citation practices are impeccable throughout paper (3%) and in bibliography (2%): 5%
4
-some low level errors in text
Total points:
87B+