Deck 8: Social Process Theories

Question 1

What do social process theories claim helps cause criminality?

A) individual socialization
B) neighbourhood disorganization
C) social strain
D) cultural deviance

Answer 1

individual socialization

Question 2

What is one concept that social process theories share?

A) Social disorganization of the immediate environment affects criminality.
B) Regardless of socio-demographic factors, all people have the potential to become delinquents or criminals.
C) Economic status is a major factor in creating a criminal.
D) Crime is a social process that is transferred from generation to generation through a complex mixture of genetic predisposition and cultural transmission.

Answer 2

Regardless of socio-demographic factors, all people have the potential to become delinquents or criminals.

Question 3

Which term refers to the process of human development and enculturation?

A) internalization
B) socialization
C) master Status
D) differential association

Answer 3

socialization

Question 4

What do social process theorists focus their attention on?

A) the biochemical balance of the individual and his or her diet
B) the extent of anomie in the individual and his or her neighbourhood
C) the socialization of the youth and his or her developmental factors
D) the economic structure of the society and its impact on the form of crime

Question 5

Which term refers to a social control mechanism?

A) family members
B) peers
C) social class
D) police officers

Question 6

Which component of youth development do social process theories focus on?

A) socialization
B) educational attainment
C) collective identity
D) social deviance

Question 7

What is the relationship between single-parent households and delinquent behaviour in young people?

A) There is a positive relationship
B) There is a negative relationship
C) There is no relationship.
D) The relationship varies based on race.

Question 8

What is the relationship between delinquent behaviour in one- and two-parent families as it relates to the young person's gender?

A) The difference in delinquent behaviour between girls was greater than the boys'.
B) The difference in delinquent behaviour between girls was less than the boys'.
C) Both delinquent behaviours rates were virtually the same, regardless of gender.
D) Family-structure delinquency relationships aren't gender-based.

Question 9

Parental discipline of a child is often cited as important in the development of a young person. Which type of discipline is likely to place the young person at a higher risk of misbehaviour and involvement in criminal activity?

A) firm but fair
B) unfair
C) administered by a mother
D) inconsistent

Question 10

According to the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, which group of children is most likely to engage in aggressive behaviours?

A) those who feel unsafe at school
B) those who are bullied at school
C) those who witness drug use on school grounds
D) those who feel rejected by peers

Question 11

According to the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, which factor best explains aggressive behaviour in a young person?

A) birth month
B) parental educational attainment
C) parental criminal record
D) being bullied at school

Question 12

According to previous research, what is an important factor in the classroom for supporting high-risk children?

A) tutors
B) increased access to nutritious snacks
C) emotional support
D) negative reinforcement

Question 13

Which of the following is shown to be the biggest factor among children involved in the lower levels of delinquent acts involving property?

A) their feelings towards importance of grades in school
B) their educational aspirations
C) their overall progress at school
D) whether or not they like school

Question 14

Which terms refers to an enduring label given to someone that taint's his or her identity and changes how he or she is perceived by others?

A) ostracized
B) glamourized
C) stigmatized
D) vilified

Question 15

Which scenario exemplifies a method of formal stigmatization in some school systems?

A) the sports teams being divided into first string and second string
B) the "track" system that identifies some students as college-bound and others as underachievers
C) when the principle says names of "bad" kids over the PA system
D) when the honour roll is published in the school newspaper

Question 16

According to the textbook, why might diversion from formal punishments be a good thing for young offenders?

A) Prisons are full of hardened criminals.
B) Stigmatization can affect their future employment chances.
C) There is a poor return on investment for youths who go to prison.
D) Formal punishments don't work.

Question 17

According to Davies and Tanner, what formal punishment has a negative effect on females?

A) community service
B) probation
C) suspension from school
D) stigmatization

Question 18

Where were 27 percent of youth assaults found to take place?

A) parks
B) school
C) sporting events
D) concerts

Question 19

What percentage of crimes occurring at schools involved firearms?

A) 1
B) 2
C) 4
D) 7

Question 20

Which group of children did the World Health Organization identify as suffering bullying at a rate of one in every seven children in this group?

A) autistic
B) mentally ill
C) anorexic
D) overweight

Question 21

Which type of bullying were girls more likely to be victims of?

A) relational
B) aggressive
C) physical
D) emotional

Question 22

According to the textbook, which of the following is a positive benefit of peer groups?

A) Peers can assist in absconding from criminal activities.
B) Peers provide positive reinforcement of only good behaviour.
C) Having a strong peer group discourages drug use.
D) With peers, young people are able to see others have similar problems.

Question 23

Between what ages do children begin to seek out a stable peer group?

A) 5 and 6
B) 8 and 14
C) 10 and 15
D) 15 and 19

Question 24

What does research show to be a more significant inhibitor of crime than the mere holding of religious beliefs and values?

A) a family history of church attendance
B) participation in religious services on the part of the individual
C) belief in a polytheistic religion
D) the rejection of satanic principles

Question 25

Which theory would suggest that church attendance and crime rates are inversely correlated because criminals are unlikely to be able to sit through an entire religious service?

A) arousal
B) differential association
C) containment
D) social control

Question 26

Which branch of social process theory suggests that people learn techniques and attitudes of crime from close relationships with criminal peers?

A) peer
B) social learning
C) labelling
D) social control

Question 27

What are the three branches of social process theory?

A) strain, social learning, and labelling theory
B) social learning, peer theory, and labelling theory
C) conflict, peer, and control theory
D) social learning, social control, and labelling theory

Question 28

Which branch of theory does social learning theory belong to?

A) peer
B) social process
C) labelling
D) social control

Question 29

Which branch of social process theory suggests that behaviour is modelled through observation of human interactions, either in person or in the media?

A) social learning
B) labelling
C) control
D) social structure

Question 30

Which branch of social process theory argues that society creates deviance by designating certain individuals as deviant?

A) social learning
B) labelling
C) control
D) social structure

Question 31

Which branch of social process theory believes that crime occurs when the forces that bind people are weakened?

A) social learning
B) social structure
C) control
D) labelling

Question 32

Which branch of social process theory says that people are born "bad" and must be controlled to be good?

A) peer
B) social learning
C) labelling
D) deviant acts

Question 33

What theory of crime would be interested in how to hot-wire a car, roll a joint, and deal with the guilt and shame associated with illegal activity?

A) labelling
B) social control
C) social learning
D) choice

Question 34

What type of social process theory are differential association, differential reinforcement, and neutralizations theories examples of?

A) social control
B) social learning
C) labelling
D) behavioural reinforcement

Question 35

Who first put forth the theory of differential association?

A) Edwin Sutherland
B) Travis Hirschi
C) Edwin Lemert
D) Ronald Akers

Question 36

According to Sutherland, which type of crime disputes the notion that crime is related to lower-class people and poverty?

A) murder
B) drug dealing
C) white-collar crime
D) sexual assault

Question 37

According to differential association theory, what is criminal behaviour?

A) inherited
B) a function of social relations
C) learned
D) a function of culture conflict

Question 38

What does Edwin Sutherland believe about crime?

A) Illegal behaviour is learned actively.
B) Simply living in a criminogenic environment is enough to cause criminality.
C) IQ is associated with criminality.
D) Dysfunctional families are the root cause of criminality.

Question 39

Which theory says that crime is a politically defined construct and that it is defined by the government authorities who are in political control?

A) differential reinforcement
B) labelling
C) containment
D) differential association

Question 40

According to the principles of differential association, where does the learning of criminal definitions take place?

A) in interaction with formal social institutions
B) by the viewing of movies and television
C) within intimate personal groups
D) during the process of investigation and arrest by criminal justice officials

Question 41

According to the principles of differential association, what does a criminal perceive will be the result of violating the law?

A) any positive outcome
B) a greater benefit than unfavourable consequences
C) neither benefit or harm
D) a potential for harm, but most likely nothing actually harmful

Question 42

According to the principles of differential association, why does learning definitions favourable to criminality produce illegal behaviour?

A) These definitions falsely portray crime as a way to make easy money.
B) The motives for criminal behaviour are not the same as conventional behaviour.
C) Criminality is enticing to those living in poverty.
D) Those people adopting definitions favourable to criminality do not have enough education to understand why criminal behaviour is wrong.

Question 43

What is one of the problems social scientists have with testing differential association theory?

A) Deciphering an individual's definitions is impossible.
B) Catching criminals with a "definition toward criminality" is harder than catching pro-social criminals.
C) It is difficult to determine when definitions toward criminality outweigh pro-social definitions.
D) Differentiation is too vague a concept.

Question 44

What happens when one perceives more favourable than unfavourable consequences to violating the law?

A) crime
B) anomie
C) strain
D) deterrence

Question 45

According to differential association theory, what produces illegal behaviour?

A) social disorganization, anomie, and strain
B) learning deviant norms through definitions favourable toward criminality
C) being weak in the four elements of the social bond
D) being labelled a deviant and then turning later on to secondary deviance as a definition of oneself

Question 46

What does differential association theory maintain about peer relations in criminals and deviants?

A) Deviants have no friends and therefore commit crime as a result of loneliness.
B) Deviants have an abundance of friends who positively influence them; however, they choose not to listen.
C) Deviants maintain close relationships with other delinquent youths.
D) Deviants push away anyone who tries to get close to them.

Question 47

What has research found about the influence of friendships made later in life; a finding that challenges some of the assumptions in differential association?

A) Friendships cultivated earlier in life had more of an influence on criminality than friendships made more recently.
B) Adult friendships create opportunities to commit crime than those made when young.
C) Friendships made later in life are more likely to be based on shared patterns of drug use than those made when young.
D) Friendships cultivated later in life had more of an influence on criminality than friendships acquired earlier in life.

Question 48

What type of research should be used to measure subjects over time to determine the effect of exposure to deviance in order to see whether law violators develop a group of like-minded peers?

A) paper based survey, administered once
B) digital survey, administered once
C) longitudinal study
D) review of a data set containing information on high school grades for all people arrested in a given area during a one-year period

Question 49

According to recent research, what type of criminal activity is differential association particularly suited to explain?

A) serial murder
B) adolescent substance abuse
C) white-collar crime
D) pedophilia

Question 50

What significant methodological difficulty is a weakness of self-report studies to determine the validity of differential association theory?

A) Subjects experience memory failure.
B) It is difficult to determine whether differential associations were the cause or the result of crime.
C) It is difficult to get parents to discuss their criminality.
D) Differential associations involve social interactions, which are always difficult to determine.

Question 51

Critics of differential association theory say that it is impossible to determine whether differential associations were the cause or the result of criminal behaviour. What must researchers do to answer this criticism?

A) Conduct longitudinal analyses that measures subjects repeatedly over time to determine whether those exposed to excess definitions of deviance eventually become deviant.
B) Assess case studies and self-report surveys asking criminals about the way they felt before and after they committed a crime.
C) Examine interventions in the school system that assess whether certain groups are more prone to differential associations.
D) Conduct surveys of prison inmates that determine the positive influences that those inmates had in their lives.

Question 52

What is one valid criticism of Edwin Sutherland's work?

A) It doesn't explain why one youth exposed to delinquent definitions succumbs to them, while another in similar circumstances does not.
B) It focuses only on spontaneous and wanton acts that have little utility purpose.
C) It stresses that only the lower class can learn deviant behaviour.
D) It is limited to only a few facets of antisocial activity, like gangs.

Question 53

A common misconception is that differential association argues criminality is the result of who you spend time with. If this were accurate, which profession would be most likely to engage in criminality?

A) doctor's
B) accountants
C) farmers
D) police officers

Question 54

A common misconception is that differential association argues criminality is the result of who you spend time with. According to Sutherland, what is the reason people engage in persistent criminality?

A) Criminals spend time with deviants at many different points in their life.
B) Individuals take part in crime based on who they grew up with, not who they hang out with now.
C) Criminals have excess definitions towards criminality.
D) Police target those who hang around with known criminals, thereby only catching criminals who associate with criminals, skewing the samples Sutherland used to make his claims.

Question 55

What is the most significant criticism of differential association theory?

A) its reliance on outdated psychological principles
B) the vagueness of its terms, which makes it difficult to test
C) the issue of ethics in testing adolescent behaviours
D) the difficulty of replicating studies in a cross-national study

Question 56

Who developed the differential reinforcement theory?

A) Ronald Akers
B) Gresham Sykes
C) David Matza
D) Albert Bandura

Question 57

Differential reinforcement theory combines the elements of what two theories?

A) differential labelling and behavioural psychology
B) anomie and differential labelling
C) differential association and psychological learning theory
D) social conflict and differential association

Question 58

Which of the following best defines the term "direct conditioning"?

A) when behaviour is either rewarded or punished during interaction with others
B) when subterranean values of the morally tinged are accepted into society
C) when the individual is taught by another how to roll a joint or break into a house
D) when the brain confuses good with bad and the ego centre goes awry

Question 59

According to the textbook, what is a key component of imitation?

A) physical proximity
B) parental activity
C) observational learning experiences
D) emotional stimulation

Question 60

What is loss of reward considered to be in differential reinforcement theory?

A) positive reward
B) punishment avoided
C) positive stimuli
D) negative punishment

Question 61

According to differential reinforcement theory, what determines whether deviant or criminal behaviour is begun or persists?

A) the degree to which it has been rewarded or punished
B) the degree to which criminals are able to neutralize their behaviours
C) the degree to which external living conditions influence behaviour
D) the degree to which conventional ties to society are broken or are weakened

Question 62

According to differential reinforcement theory, where does the principle influence on behaviour come from?

A) older individuals in high status positions
B) peers who model negative behaviour
C) groups that control individuals reinforcement and punishment
D) respected community elders

Question 63

According to differential reinforcement theory, when is criminality expected?

A) when police services do not align with community needs
B) when peers project confidence in their ability to commit criminal activity without punishment
C) when school systems fail to properly indoctrinate young people
D) when crime has been differentially reinforced over alternative behaviour, and seen as desirable

Question 64

In Ronald Akers's survey of 3,065 male and female adolescents, what was found to have a strong association with social learning variables?

A) drug and alcohol use
B) truancy
C) shoplifting
D) physical assaults against other adolescents

Question 65

Whose writing is associated with neutralization theory?

A) Matza and Sykes
B) Lemert and Hirschi
C) Sutherland and Cressey
D) Hirschi and Hindelang

Question 66

What theory maintains that most offenders hold conventional attitudes but adopt techniques that enable them to temporarily ignore these values?

A) subterranean behaviours
B) containment
C) control
D) neutralization

Question 67

Which statement best defines the concept of subterranean values?

A) They are the values of homeless people living in train stations.
B) They are morally tinged influences that are condemned by certain members of society.
C) They exist in prison and are codes of conduct that inmates follow to gain respect and to avoid being ridiculed or hurt.
D) They are values that are upheld by the law when police officers arrest and prosecute criminals.

Question 68

Which type of value exists alongside of subterranean values?

A) pornographic
B) illegitimate
C) conventional
D) disreputable

Question 69

Which activity is an example of a subterranean value?

A) a man killing his disabled horse
B) a woman reading comic books
C) a man watching hard-core pornography
D) a woman fleeing the scene after running over a dog while driving drunk

Question 70

In neutralization theory, what term refers to the process of moving in and out of delinquency?

A) denial
B) neutralization
C) condemnation
D) drift

Question 71

According to neutralization theory's concept of drift, which group has a lifestyle that is able to embrace both conventional and deviant values?

A) police
B) lawyers
C) youth
D) middle class adults

Question 72

What neutralization technique are young offenders using when they claim that unlawful acts were not their fault and resulted from forces beyond their control?

A) denial of injury
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of victim
D) condemnation of the condemners

Question 73

What neutralization technique is used when offenders claim that stealing is "borrowing" and vandalism is "mischief"?

A) denial of injury
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of victim
D) condemnation of the condemners

Question 74

Omar makes a living by robbing drug dealers. When discussing his activities with a member of his gang, he explains that while his actions may sometimes harm, or even kill, the people he is robbing, the drug dealers he steals from put themselves in the position to be robbed because of their chosen profession. Which type of neutralization is this an example of?

A) denial of victim
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of injury
D) condemnation of the condemners

Question 75

What neutralization technique is used when criminals say victims "had it coming"?

A) denial of injury
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of victim
D) condemnation of the condemners

Question 76

What neutralization technique is used when criminals argue computer hacking is just a prank that allows young people to try out new programming skills?

A) denial of responsibility
B) appeal to higher loyalties
C) condemnation of the condemners
D) denial of injury

Question 77

Since the world is dog-eat-dog, it is unfair to blame a kid for doing what cops and judges do themselves. What neutralization technique is this an example of?

A) denial of injury
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of victim
D) condemnation of the condemners

Question 78

Everyone has to stick by their friends even if it sometimes means you have to break the law to protect them. What neutralization technique is this an example of?

A) denial of injury
B) denial of responsibility
C) denial of victim
D) Appeal to higher loyalties

Question 79

Which neutralization technique is used when a criminal does something morally wrong because they felt it was necessary?

A) defence of necessity
B) the metaphor of the ledger
C) claim of entitlement
D) denial of the law's necessity

Question 80

Which neutralization technique is used when a criminal believes the good coming from their actions outweighs the bad?

A) defence of necessity
B) the metaphor of the ledger
C) claim of entitlement
D) denial of the law's necessity