Exam 4: Explaining Organized Crime

Merton conceived of organized crime as:

___________ refers to a source of patterning in human conduct; it is the sum of patterns of social relationships and shared meanings by which people give order, expression, and value to common experiences.

nvironmental factors can alter the expression of genes, thus influencing the behavior of the individual.

lexis de Tocqueville described pathological materialism as an American preoccupation with economic success.

Ethnic succession theory posits that OC provides a "queer ladder to success" for disadvantaged groups who eventually leave OC, making way for the next wave.

___________ suggests a strain between societal expectations for success and limited opportunity causes certain persons to innovate in the form of OC.

The fact that many contemporary American Mafia members' children have followed them into "the life" tells us that ethnic succession theory is ____________.

o a great extent, the environment inhabited by organized crime reinforces antisocial behavior and frequently ridicules conventional, conforming behavior.

Clinical psychology is based, to various extents, on psychoanalytic theory, a body of work fathered by:

Which of the following is an internal restraint?

Which of the following is not an external restraint?

In the _______ subculture, one finds gang activity devoted to utilitarian criminal pursuits, an adaptation that begins to approximate OC.

escribe the theory of ethnic succession as it is used in the context of organized crime. Describe its limitations as an explanation for organized crime.

hat is the connection between the criminal organizations of southern Italy-Mafia, Camorra, 'Ndrangheta, Sacra Corona Unita-and the American Mafia?

ccording to learning theory, antisocial behavior is sometimes the result of learning-positive and negative reinforcement-directly from others.

Inadequate familial socialization prevents some persons from:

In the _________ subculture, one finds gang activities devoted to violence and destructive acting out as a way of gaining status.

hat are Merton's five modes of adaptation? Why is innovation most important when studying organized crime?

In order for an OC group to survive, it must have a/n _______________ process for inducting new members and inculcating them with the values and ways of behaving prescribed by the social system.

Persons with ________________ have a poorly developed superego-they are psychopaths or sociopaths-and are restrained only by the fear of punishment.