Deck 1: Introduction

Question 1

Officer Jones was walking his beat in the City when he saw a teenage girl spray painting a set of initials on an alley wall. Officer Jones shouts at the girl to stop. She stands there and sadly shakes her head no. Jones walks over and notices that the initials are those of a young man who was shot two days earlier in that very spot. He talks to the girl for a moment and then walks on as she finishes her initials. This scenario is an example of deviance as

A) an objective phenomenon.
B) a subjective phenomenon.
C) a criminal problem.
D) answers a and c are correct.

Answer 1

B

Question 2

_______ includes laws and formal regulations as well as informal or unstated (but understood) expectations.

A) Deviance
B) Power
C) Social control
D) Fascism

Answer 2

C

Question 3

By focusing on deviant behavior as objectively real, _______ tend to make assumptions about the deviant status of their study.

A) subjectivists
B) positivists
C) mixed theorists
D) none of the above are correct

Answer 3

B

Question 4

_______ methods reduce the social world to numbers and statistical relationships in an attempt to determine causal relationships.

A) Quantitative
B) Qualitative
C) Mixed
D) Ethnographic

Question 5

Jane Researcher was examining the role that state repression plays in the rate of suicide among underprivileged youth. To pursue this study, Jane went to three countries and requested the number of deaths due to suicide for the previous three years and the personal information of the deceased as well as the family income and neighborhood of residence. In this study, Jane is most likely examining suicide from the _______ level of analysis.

A) face-to-face
B) meso
C) macro
D) social psychological

Question 6

Describe the differences between the two broad methodological categories. What types of epistemologies are more likely to be used for each?

Question 7

How does social context impact the study of deviance and social control?

Question 8

What are the primary strengths and limitations for subjectivism and positivism?

Question 9

How might we conceive of face-to-face and social-psychological levels of analysis as a micro level of analysis? By doing so, do we complicate our demarcation of the meso level of analysis? Put differently, can we define a clear continuum from micro to macro or is the meso always relative to other levels of analysis as defined by their contexts?

Question 10

Describe, in your own words, a behavior you feel is clearly deviant OR a behavior society defines as deviant that you feel should not be considered as such. In your description make sure to tell why in either case. Then use a particular theory from one of the sociological perspectives you feel best explains this form of deviance (or "non" deviance, in your opinion). Be sure to explain in detail how the theory describes it, and DO NOT just say "theory X describes deviant behavior Y" and leave it at that.