What Is Deviant Behavior?

Deviance has sociological and psychological implications. Deviant behavior refers to activities that are disapproved of by society, and which have legal consequences. Deviant behavior describes an action or behavior that violates social norms, and social rules. Deviant behavior is a behavioral disposition that is not in conformity with an institutionalized set-up or code of conduct. Some sociologists explain deviant behavior using the nature and characteristics of individuals.

A certain act or behavior may be viewed as deviant behavior and receive sanctions or punishments within one society and be seen as a normal behavior in another society. Sociologists stress the importance of labeling theory or stigma.

Formal deviance, in a sociological context, describes actions or behaviors that violate social norms, including formally-enacted rules, and informal violations of social norms, social folkways and social mores.

Formal deviant behavior can be described as a crime, which violates laws in a society. Informal deviant behaviors are minor violations that break unwritten rules of social life. Norms that have great moral significance are mores. Under informal deviance, a more opposes societal taboos, and taboo is a strong social form of deviant behavior.

Deviant behavior is difficult to study because most people are reluctant to be honest about their “deviant” activities because of the social sanctions associated with them. Interpersonal reactions to deviance may have a significant effect of increasing the likelihood of subsequent deviant behavior. Formal and informal controls constrain most people to conform to social norms. Then, why do some people engage in such deviant behavior even if social punishment is expected? The functionalist perspective in deviance and social control is best represented by David Emile Durkheim and Talcott Parsons.

According to Durkheim and the Functionalists there are Positive Consequences of deviant behavior and social control. Primary Deviance is an initial deviant act. Deviant behaviors that are short-term or cease with adult status. Secondary Deviance is deviance that results from being labeled as deviant. Deviant behaviors are long-term and does not cease with adult status. Sociologists explain deviant behavior in terms of broad social conditions in which deviance is most likely to grow, looking at the social structure and characteristics of society and sociology of groups within society (Robert King Merton, Cloward and Ohlin).

Social Construction Of Deviant Behavior

Moral entrepreneurs are those who construct deviant behavior. They claim that a social phenomenon is a problem serious enough to warrant immediate attention and decisive action. How does homophobia in women’s sports maintain the line between gender-specific normal and deviant behaviors? What does this have to do with patriarchy?

The Social Construction of Deviant Behavior in Homeless and Runaway Youth: Implications for Practice. Bart W. Miles & Scott K. Okamoto. Abstract: This study examined the social construction of deviance in a sample of homeless and/or runaway youth in metropolitan Phoenix.

Moral Panics: The Social Construction of Deviance
Erich Goode, ‎Nachman Ben-Yehuda - 2010. Packed with new examples and material, this second edition providesa fully up-to-date exploration of the genesis, dynamics, and demiseof moral panics and their impacts on the societies in which they take place.

Constructions of Deviance: Social Power, Context, and Interaction by Patricia A. Adler, Peter Adler.

Deviant Behavior Abstracts

A Deductive Theory of Deviance
Chris Bader. Stark and Bainbridge begin with specifically stated assumptions based upon social exchange theory generate propositions that explain how the exchange of rewards and differentials in power lead to patterns of interaction. Propositions to explain the emergence of society, culture, norms, and stratification are included. The resulting integrated theory utilizes concepts from conflict perspectives, labeling theory, differential association, social control, routine activities theory, and anomie theory.

Deviant Behavior and Victimization Among Homeless and Runaway Adolescents
LES B. WHITBECK, DAN R. HOYT, KEVIN A. YODER, ANA MARI CAUCE, MATT PARADISE. High-risk population of runaway and homeless adolescents is used to investigate the effects of a history of caretaker abuse. Life course developmental theory and lifestyle exposure theory are included.

Synergies in Deviance: Revisiting the Positive Deviance Debate
Brad West. Abstract: The debate surrounding the concept of positive deviance. That the term positive deviance is strategic for understanding the narrative and sacred dimensions of deviant social phenomena.

Adolescent Social Bond, Self-Control and Deviant Behavior in China - Gabe T. Wang, Hengrui Qiao, Shaowai Hong, and Jie Zhang. Abstract: Based on Travis Warner Hirschi's social control theory and the theory of self-control developed by Gottfredson and Hirschi, this research developed a structural equation model and tested it on 527 adolescents in Southern China. The findings of this research seem to support Travis Warner Hirschi's social control theory. Gottfredson and Hirschi's newer theory of self-control fails to predict for the Chinese adolescents.

Subculture and Deviant Behavior in the Organizational Context. Abstract: The theory is based on the notion that both motivation and opportunity must come together to produce deviant behavior.

Discipline and Deviant Behavior in Our Youth - Ron Bell. The number of young people involved in deviant behavior has not only tripled and the age has gotten lower. Trouble in the American family has also led to trouble with today's youth. Juvenile crime is increasing in the nation.The objective was to determine how adolescent social bond and self-control affect substance use and deviant behavior.

Routine Activities in Social Context: A Closer Look at the role of Opportunities in Deviant Behavior - Jon Gunnar Bernburg. ABSTRACT: Argues that routine activities cannot simply be understood as neutral patternings of structural changes. As hypothesized, the effects of routine actitivites on types of deviant behavior are considerably reduced when differential social relations are controlled.

ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN DRUG USE and DEVIANT BEHAVIOUR in TEENAGERS. Ron D Hays & Phyllis L Ellickson - Early antisocial behavior, impaired family relationships, delinquent or drug-using peers are some common reasons for drug use and delinquency.

Adolescent Deviant Behavior: Who Is Influencing Our Youth? Leila Saliba. Adolescent deviant behavior and the environment that the child lives affects the choices they make. Social pressures affect adolescents the most.

An Economic Theory of Deviance - Jeong-Yoo Kim, Gang Lee. Abstract: Model of deviance by incorporating the labeling effect into rational choice theory. We provide an explanation of the process through which a deviant is being stigmatized.

Early Deviance and Related Risk Factors in the Children of Narcotic Addicts
David N. Nurco, D.S.W., Robert Blatchley, Thomas E. Hanlon, Kevin E. O’Grady. Abstract: This study examines the self-reported behaviors of 285 male and female adolescent children. Findings of the study revealed that early deviance in the children of addicts was related to later adolescent drug use.

Adolescent Children of Narcotic Addicts: Deviant Behaviors and Their Correlates. - David N. Nurco, D.S.W.

A Brief Definition of Deviance. What are deviant behavior and social control? Erich Goode begins by debunking what he considers false conceptions of deviance. Erich Goode's "Five Misleading Definitions of Deviance" correspond to the misconceptions of many laypersons and several scholars as well.

Deviant Identity as a Moderator of the Relation between Negative Self-Feelings and Deviant Behavior
Howard B. Kaplan, Cheng-Hsien Lin. As hypothesized, for youths without a deviant identity, negative self-feelings had both direct and indirect positive effects on later deviant behavior.

Self-Perceptions of Friendship-Making Ability and Perceptions of Friends’ Deviant Behavior: Childhood to Adolescence - Carolyn McNamara Barry, Allan Wigfield.

The Implications of Respondent Loss in Panel Studies of Deviant Behavior - Sheila Cordray, Kenneth Polk.

The Conception of Criminality Illustrated by a Stochastic Process Model for Deviant Behavior - Eggert Petersen.

Adolescent Sexual Activity and Mildly Deviant Behavior
Sibling and Friendship Effects - JOSEPH LEE RODGERS, DAVID C. ROWE.

Nonparametric Analysis of Adolescent Deviant Behavior
YUNLING DU, MICHAEL G. AKRITAS, STEVEN F. ARNOLD, D. WAYNE OSGOOD.

The Morality of Employee Theft: Teaching about Ethics and Deviant Behavior in the Workplace - Roland E. Kidwell, Jr., Susan M. Kochanowski. Because of cost to both organizations and people, deviant behavior at work is an important topic for management education.

The Influence of Adolescent Substance Use and Socialization on Deviant Behavior in Young Adulthood - SYBILLE M. GUY, P. M. BENTLER, GENE M. SMITH.

Geneticization of Deviant Behavior and Consequences for Stigma: The Case of Mental Illness
Phelan, Jo C. Abstract: According to "genetic essentialist" thinking, genes are the basis of human identity and strongly deterministic of behavior.

Medicalization in Nepal: A Study of the Influence of Westernization on Defining Deviant and Illness Behavior in a Developing Country - L. Allen Furr.

Deviant Behavior Books

Deviant Behavior and Human Rights. by John F. Galliher (Editor). Focuses on theories and occurrences that brought about an increase in human rights concerns, and explores how these concerns are related to the deviant behavior of offenders.

Deviant Behavior - Alex D Thio, Jim D Taylor and Martin D Schwartz. Deviant Behavior covers a wide spectrum of theories of deviance, and analyzes numerous specific deviant behaviors. The author uses an abundance of research data, including many that debunk our common assumptions about deviant behavior.

Deviance and Social Control: A Sociological Perspective - Michelle Inderbitzin, Kristin A Bates and Randy R Gainey. The authors offer a clear overview of issues and perspectives in the field, including introductions to classic and current sociological theories as well as research on definitions and causes of deviance and reactions to deviant behavior.

Degrees of Deviance: Student Accounts of Their Deviant Behavior - Stuart Henry, Roger Eaton (Editors). In many courses on deviance students are asked to read research literature so they may understand other people's rule-breaking behavior. But the deviant behavior that they read about has little similarity in content to the deviant behavior that they do. Published studies of deviant behavior are typically based on research conducted ten to twenty years earlier.

Encyclopedia of Criminology and Deviant Behavior. by Clifton D. Bryant (Editor). The Encyclopedia of Criminology and Deviant Behavior is the first truly comprehensive work in the field of criminology and sociology. There are over 550 entries each with 2,000 to 3,500 words covering a multitiude of topics related to criminology, deviant behavior, and other unusual sociological phenomena..

Readings in Deviant Behavior: Classic and Contemporary - Nathaniel Eugene Terrell, Robert F. Meier, Robert Meier. The text is organized traditionally, beginning with a discussion on the nature of deviance followed by material on theories and perspectives to explain deviance and ending with articles that discuss forms of deviant behavior.

Social Control & Socialization: The Role Of Morality As A Social Mechanism In Adolescent Deviant Behavior - Robert Svensson. The framework is that when the socialization process functions well, and norms and values are internalized, an individual will develop a moral sense as to what is right and wrong. In line with this, morality is examined as a social mechanism that may assist us in understanding and explaining the relationship between socialization and adolescent deviance and criminal offenses.

Sociology of Deviant Behavior - Marshall B. Clinard, Robert F. Meier. Sociology of Deviant Behavior has been the market-leading deviance/criminology textbook for more than 40 years by combining timely research findings and updated data with solid sociological analysis. The fifteenth edition examines topics as justified deviance; corporate crime and mistakes, such as the General Motors ignition problem; the changing moral landscape regarding gay marriage; the importance of social media in facilitating deviant acts; political crime, including electoral crime; and cultural and social reactions to deviance.

The Deviant Mystique : Involvements, Realities, and Regulation - Robert Prus, Scott Grills. Who defines deviance? Why? What are the effects of deviance on others? How do subcultures form? These and other questions are answered in this unique approach to the study of deviance. This thoughtful consideration serves to shed new light on the mystique that has been created around ideas about deviant behavior.