Deviance

"In the U.S. you have to be a deviant or exist in extreme boredom...

Make no mistake; all intellectuals are deviants in the U.S."

-- William Seward Burroughs (b. 1914), American writer, naturalist

A person would be considered to be acting deviantly in society if they are violating what the significant social norm in that particular culture is. What causes humans to act certain ways is a disputed topic among researchers for some time now. There are three types of researchers that have tried to answer this question. There is the psychological answer, biological answer, and the sociological answer. With all of the studies that have been performed, no one group has come up with an exact reason to why people behave deviantly. Although, sociologists' theories have not been disproved as often as the psychologists' and biologists' theories because their experiments are too hard to define and no one definition for deviance is agreed upon by all experimenters (Pfuhl, 40).

My own curiosity to find out what the influences are behind deviant behavior is the purpose for this paper. I wanted to find out more information to see if biological factors are also behind this kind of behavior. The most knowledge acquired for why people act deviantly is from the sociological perspective. There is need for more research, if possible, in the psychological and biological perspectives, but there is a lot more known in the sociological viewpoint. The reality that the definition of deviant behavior is considered different by everyone makes it complicated and unknown if a truly accurate answer can ever be found (Pfuhl 18). This is why this topic is important to the study of sociology. Sociologists have more information, and therefore may be closer to finding the cause. For this reason, my main focus in this paper is at the sociological stand point of deviance with some explanations from psychologists and biologists.

The family is the link to socialization in one's environment (Four Categories 1). In the family, divorce, conflict within family, neglect, abuse, and deviant parents are the main vindicates for the offspring's actions. Early researches first only thought parental absence affects girls and whites. Modern research finds that the lack of supervision, or support a child needs is a link to delinquency in any race. It occurs more in single parent homes because they have a harder time doing those things.

Poverty is also a reason in the family for conflict because it can lead to both family breakups and delinquency. Children need close, supportive, relationships with parents. What promotes deviance in the home is the inhibition to talk to parents. The child may feel that they need to get attention elsewhere, thus acting deviantly if their parents are not there for them. Parents can prevent this by being competent, non-punitive (to a point), non-aggressive or violent, and teach their child high self-confidence.

Family conflict has more damaging effects on children than divorce. Where as parental death has less impact than divorce (Four Categories 2). When a parent dies a child at least knows that the parent did not want to leave on his own terms and probably also did not inflict any abuse to his or her psyche before the parent passes away. Also, if a child still has contact with both parents after a divorce, the less likely they will feel neglected and react deviantly.

Family size also leaves an adolescent without the necessary attention they need as an individual. Middle children are more likely to behave deviantly because they go unnoticed more than their younger or older siblings. The legal definition of abuse and neglect varies from state to state but does, in any form, create serious consequences for behavior. It occurs in patterns and not just once, which causes stress, poor self-esteem, aggressiveness, lack of empathy, and fewer interactions with peers. Child abuse is any physical or emotional trauma to a child for which no reasonable explanation is found. Neglect refers to the deprivation that children suffer at the hands of parents (Deviance 1). Such components that comply with these definitions are non-accidental physical injury and neglect, emotional abuse or neglect, sexual abuse, and abandonment. Over one million of the youth in America are subjected to abuse a year. In terms of sexual abuse one in ten abused are boys and one in three of them are girls. It is really unknown how many cases go unreported in any area of abuse or neglect a year. From 1980 to 1986 reported cases did go up sixty percent. The most common reasons found that parents abuse their child is because this is a learned function they acquired from their parents. This tendency to pass down deviant behavior through generations is a cycle of family violence (Lemert 48). Parents are unable to separate childhood traumas from the relationships with their own kids. A group called Child Protective Services is created to remove abuse from the sibling that can cause more harm to the victim. This is not always the best option for a family because bigger problems may arise out of seeking protective services. The rest of the family blames them for the shame in their name and the main "bread winner" could go to prison. Another unhealthy thing to learn from a parent is the feeling of isolation from family and friends. This is more common is single parent families and lower classes. If a person is living in a lower class, single-parent environment, they are then at a real disadvantage. It may be because they do not feel they are good enough to belong in the realms of society. Delinquency is when a child acts out their hostility towards the parent or abuser in a deviant manner (Lemert 59). Parents need to correctly punish their child when they see deviant behavior and give them love, but the problem is that some parents do not see it.

Other influences outside of the home can cause of person to act deviantly. Peers, media images, and other people in society set what the norm should be in a given area. In the South higher numbers of people commit hate crimes still today. This hatred for a race is practiced over one hundred years ago. The idea that one race should be inferior and hate another race is something a person is not born with, and must have learned. Men are taught that the norm is to be aggressive, and even violent. What is normal can be relatively different in various areas of the world. Some may even accept harsher offenses such as rape and murder.

What is deviant can be changed over time once society as a whole feels more comfortable and accepting of the certain type of deviant behavior. Only certain people once got tattoos and now it is a current