Deviance

The failure to conform to the customary norms of society is deviant behavior. All societies provide for certain standards of human behavior for the smooth running of society. These standards of behavior are known as social norms. Social Deviance is an anti-social act of an individual by violating the social norms, values, folkways, mores, social patterns, social code of conduct, and the constitutional code of conduct prescribed by the state.

Society has certain conformity which is to be obeyed by the members of society if someone violates the rules and regulations, social usage, and beliefs in the action called social deviance.

Nature of Social Deviance is as follows:

• It is a behavior that is contrary to the standards of social expectations.
• It is relative to the prescriptions and anticipations that govern particular patterns of behavior in specified time and place.
• It consists of disapproved attitudes.
• It is the act of going against the group’s shared expectations, expected behavioral patterns.
• Cheating, unfairness, malingering, immorality, dishonesty, knavery, betrayal, corruption, wickedness, drunkenness, gambling, abduction, theft robbery, and sexual assaults are some examples of deviant behavior.

The actors disturb the equilibrium of the interactive patterns of society. Juvenile delinquents seek their ends by violating the expected behavioral patterns that cause disorder, chaos, mess, and misunderstanding in pre-established sets of social patterns.

Research :

The renowned sociologists like Emile Durkheim, R.K. Merton, and Talcott Parsons did intensive research in this domain and came to the conclusion that it intentionally and objectively occurs by violating folkways and norms.

As they say, it is deviant because it is harmful and dysfunctional. Weak enforcement, over restriction to a person, cultural conflicts, poor socialization, physical and mental stress, individualism, and corrupt enforcement can trigger committing deviant behavioral patterns. They are anti-social acts committed by an individual.

You may also like Sociology