Written Observational Assignment
The mutual understanding of people in society is maintained by living within acceptable norms of behavior. However, some individuals have shown contradicting traits that have in most cases resulted in crimes, wars, and misunderstandings. Deviant behavior is any trait that tends to oppose the acceptable norms. This paper will evaluate deviant behavior among different groups by providing a background of social norms, narrating historical changes in human behaviors and providing the general public and media opinions on deviant behaviors. The paper will then provide a concluding summary of human behavior.
Background Understanding
In the understanding of deviant behavior, there has been very minimal variation from the concept of social disorganization as well as social pathology. The scientific values have failed to legitimize the concept of social groups in society because they lack a standard scale of measurement. The definition of behavior that violates the norm of the society has been considered as a deviant behavior (Markova, Nikitskaya, 2017). However, confusion has been experienced among couples, workmates or specific peer groups that violate the societal norms and embrace the family or organization cultures. On the other hand, mental illness can cause an individual to violate the acceptable norms while the legal perspective uses their scale of evaluation to classify a given behavior as deviant or non-deviant (Bryant, 2014).
According to the statistical abnormalities, most people would consider deviant behavior to be associated with some extent of good deeds as well as the culture and the popular peoples’ beliefs. The definition of deviant behaviors has been evaluated in the basic part of being in the right state of mind and departing from what is seen as morally upright to criminal activities (Reis, 2017). This has been ensured by taking criminals through mental extermination to analyze their intelligence quotient before facing the trials. Thus in the evaluation of deviant behavior, there should be no confusion between the mental illness and gross violation of the acceptable codes of conduct of the society.
Socially disvalued behaviors and the state of an individual is also considered in understanding the deviant behaviors. Blindness, ugliness and physical defects form the basis of defiant traits (Cheang, Henry & Steven, 2015). These values create stigma to an individual as they are regarded as less fortunate and unfit to take part in the community activities. It is of greater importance to understand that not all socially disvalued individuals violate the expected norms of society. On the other hand, one socially disvalued trait like ugliness may be complemented with great wisdom in an individual (Cheang, Henry & Steven, 2015).
Theories of Human Behaviors
In the evaluation of human behaviors, theories have been developed to explain different deviant behaviors. They provide biological, psychological as well as a sociological description of human traits. The theories include the structural strain theory, the labeling theory, social control theory and theory of differential association.
The social control theory was developed by Travis Hirschi and suggests that an individual deviance from the acceptable norms will occur when that individual's attachments to social bonds become weak. The theory holds that such individuals are affected by what people think about them thus will conform to social expectations because of the attachment. Although socialization may be the foundation of conformity to the social rules, deviance will occur once the conformity is broken (Greene, 2017). According to this theory, people may feel an irresistible attraction to the deviant behavior but they are prevented by the attachments to the social norm.
Differential association theory is a learning process that provides the necessary steps towards committing a crime or deviation from acceptable behaviors. The process of an innocent person interacting with criminals will relay the values, attitude, techniques as well as the motives of the criminals to the innocent individual. According to this theory, peer influence will contribute to deviant behavior in a person (Gintis, 2014). On the other hand, the structural strain theory holds it that culture and the social structure influences the behaviors of an individual. Consequently, tension will develop in an individual who fails to meet the cultural goals following the social structural constraints. This will result in a deviant behavior which may not have been the expectation of the individual.
The understanding of criminal behavior is well described using the labeling theory. In this theory, an assumption is made in defining the deviant behavior but rather focusses on the ruling on the take on the deviants and the non-deviants (Daly & Wilson, 2017). The labeling theory is associated with those who hold power to establish what will be considered as proper behavior on the considerations of gender, class, race or the status in the community.
Historical Subject Matters
The code of Hammarubi is the Babylonian collection that was developed in 1792-1750 BC. The legal decisions were made on the 282 collected cases on economic provisions, family issues, and other criminal related cases. The ruling was based on the status of the offenders and the circumstance of the crime (Patterson, 2017). This code of conduct was developed from civilized Semitic communities with reference from the principal source developed by French Orientalist and is preserved in the historical louver.
The Greek law code applied the social control system. It was characterized by extreme harshness and has thus painted Draco’s name as savagery synonym of law. It was designed to define conditions on the Athenian bribery with no arbitration to the justice system (Black, 2015). The ancient Athens believed in Ostracism where senior citizens threatening the peace stability were banished. This was done without bringing charges, and the voting system entailed writing of other person’s name to bring the charge. According to Aristotle, this system was believed to have been introduced by Cleisthenes to the Athens constitution in the attempt to form for a reform.
The Holy Bible introduces Hebraic laws that have been widely used in the Old Testament to illustrate how the offenders were brought to book as well as the consequences that were to befall individuals with deviant behaviors. From the Hebrew laws, the case laws contained a condition statement and the type of punishment to be issued. On the other hand, the apodictic laws outlined the divine rules that were listed in the Ten Commandments and the book of the covenant, Deuteronomy codes and the priestly codes of conduct (Nash & Kidlay, 2016). Stiff penalties for deviant behaviors included an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth according to the Hebrew laws.
The early modern contained considerations for the poor. The poor laws or the vagrancy laws were found in British history to bring relief to the poor (Bryant, 2014). According to the Elizabethan poor laws, relief was provided to the aged, infant poor and the sick while work was assigned to the non-disabled. The poor laws discouraged the non-disabled from seeking charity but rather seeking employment in the workhouse. In the later days, 1930 social legislation led to abolishing the poor laws while a comprehensive welfare system that included everyone in the society was adopted to advocate for different classes of people (Bryant, 2014).
The modern view brought to the light a different view of the crimes. According to Italian Cesare Lombroso, criminal activities were associated with reversion of the primitive state of human development. Consequently, the somatotypes had it that crimes are more common among the athlete than tall less masculine individuals (Barton, 2017). Recent research is concerned with the genotype XXX with the possibility of involvement in criminal acts. However, the general perspective has shown that people who involve in crimes may have met the described theories while in some cases they may fail to meet the descriptions.
The evaluation of status politics in America during the 19th century, a different perspective is given on the occurrence of the deviant behavior (Da Agra, 2017). A keen observation reveals that some deviant behavior is omitted while the group committing it are the ones who are considered. From the Symbolic Crusade written at the end of 19th century, a deviant behavior may be due to the fall of social honor and prestige by a certain group in the society following a political competition.
Modern times has experienced great debates on condom use, sex education and abortion where different groups from different social class hold contradicting perspectives on how such matters should be treated. The temperance movement witnessed on the modern days will consider some behaviors unacceptable by a given class of people while a different group will hold a contradicting perspective over the same behavior (Bryant, 2014). The adoption of values is influenced by specific group influence.
Public Opinion on Deviant Behavior
The public perception holds four aspects while attempting to explain the public opinion. The identified opinion, extent of reaction, social definition and the overall society reaction will classify a given attribute to be socially unacceptable (Intravia, Wolf & Piquero, 2018). When a crime is committed, specific groups in public will create the impression of condemning the crime and calling for legal action or they may remain silent despite a deviant behavior in the society. Specific individuals always front this attribute in a given social class and they possess the power to control the masses into demonstrations or mass actions.
The extent of criminal activity may create emotions on the public based on the damage levels. The modern history has been celebrated on deviant behaviors where the resulting action has negligible damage and is thus considered normal. On the other side, some crimes such as terrorism may lack a bad meaning in a given group while some groups may view it as evil and necessary action need to be taken. This results in a mixed public opinion that will make it difficult to pass judgment (Osgood, Wilson, O’Malley & Johnston, 2017). Consequently, the society contains small groups who hold different beliefs according to existing peer interactions. Existing crimes will be judged based on the majority opinion, and it may be based on an individual rather than deviant action.
The Media
Technological advancements have resulted in the increased use of social media platforms for interaction. However, there have been no acceptable norms to be followed when using such platforms. In most cases, youths may use blogs, Facebook pages, and other online platforms to share explicit contents (McCaghy, 2016). This is however regarded as immoral among some adults who feel that the use of such platforms should be regulated. Deviant behavior, in this case, can be difficult to establish.
Conclusion
Deviant behaviors are behaviors that contradict the socially acceptable norms of society. However, the understanding of deviant behavior may be difficult because of the lack of scientific measures and descriptions. Different theories have been formulated to explain why people engage in crimes but the explanation seems to contradict each other. On the other hand, different cultures have promoted different beliefs that may be contradicting each other thus making it difficult to classify an individual to be either deviant or non-deviant. The society has thus formulated a labeling system that evaluates other areas of society with considerations to institutional beliefs, the ruling authority and the public opinions on a given behavior.
The public can influence evaluation of different aspects when a crime is committed. The public comprises different groups that hold different perceptions of the crimes. Teenagers and youths may view drug and substance abuse, sexual relationships and crimes in society as their way of life. However, adults will uphold discipline among the community members, responsibility and the observation of culture as the acceptable norm. When deciding on such cases, the consequence of the crime, the majority opinion, and reference on historical past will help in restoring order. Consequently, social constraints and the class difference has resulted in deviant behaviors among some individuals. Labeling theory remains the best measure in classifying human behavior.