Y2: Psychology: Criminal: Labelling and SFP

A way of society classifying someone based on something about them that dominant and often negative.

How someone views themselves.

Interpreting someone’s past in light of someone’s present deviance.

People are likely to discuss the past of someone labelled ‘murderer’ saying he was a violent boy.

Predicting future actions by imagining what someone may do in the future based on a label they possess now.

If someone thinks someone is aggressive they may say ‘one day he will really hurt someone’.

It can impact their self-identity due to shaping how they are seen by society and so anything that is outside the norms will set someone apart from the rest of society, out-casting them.

A label reduces someone to one characteristic due to an attribute they may possess which can lead to other people viewing them in the same light and so a stereotype of that particular person starts to form.

When someone is given a dominant label of deviance over being a mother, it may outcast them from society and so lead to the individual committing crime as a result.

Someone’s expectations about another becoming reality by that person eliciting behaviours that confirm the expectations due to a false label given.

1) Others’ beliefs about someone may be false.
2) This may then change the way others act towards them
3) This may then change their beliefs about themselves
4) Our actions towards other then change and the label becomes true

• Someone may be falsely accused of theft due to parents being convicted of theft

• People would then be cautious of this person and so may avoid them

• The person may then question their self-identity

• Leading to them stealing and becoming a criminal due to everyone thinking so anyway

Boys and girls experience different socialisation with boys being allowed to play rougher than girls and so leading to them getting labelled as aggressive and troublemakers whereas girls may be passive.

P - Jahoda (2004) supports SFP
E - Looked at African tribe and found that 22% of violent criminals were boys with Wednesday names (being labelled as aggressive) and 6.9% of boys had Monday names (being labelled as placid)
E - This showed that a label led to the behaviour being true
P - Rosenthal and Jacobsen (1968) supports
E - They labelled a group of children ‘spurters’ even though may not have been true and when went back to school later found their IQ had significantly increased compared to that of other students
E - Therefore this demonstrates that a false label in SFP works due to teachers changing their attitudes towards those students to help them improve

P - Rosenthal and Jacobsen lack generalisability
E - They looked at students performance in exams after labelling a random selection of children as ‘spurters’
E - Therefore SFPs may not work in the same way with criminality as labels given in education may not be comparable
P - Difficult to study SFP
E - Involves giving people negative labels or false labels
E - Therefore this is unethical as could encourage criminality

P - Yes
E - Labelling theory suggest that we become criminals due to being outcasted and SFP suggests that we become criminal by being treated as one due to false label leading to question self-identity
E - Therefore highlighting the problems with labelling people as criminals with the example of ASBO (anti-social behaviour order) being demolished as the label made their behaviour worse

P - Fuller (1984) rejects the theory
E - He found that black girls in a London comprehensive school were labelled as likely to fail and they resented the label as so proved it wrong
E - Therefore showing that being given a label doesn’t necessarily lead to what the label suggests about the person
P - Reductionist due to biological explanations of crime as well
E - Charles Whitman had a tumor pressed against his amygdala and he killed 16 people including himself
E - Therefore showing that biology also play a part in explaining criminality highlighting how labelling and SFP discount biological factors and so need a more holistic approach