Every society runs on shared expectations about how people should behave. When people follow those expectations, society hums along; when they break them — or the expectations themselves collapse — we enter the domain of nonnormative behavior and deviance. The MCAT tests your ability to classify behaviors, identify the sociological mechanisms behind them, and apply named theories to scenarios.
Priority labels: Must know = cold; Know the logic = mechanism not names; Passage-level = recognize, don't memorize; Optional = skippable.
Social Norms
Must knowA social norm is a shared expectation about appropriate behavior in a given social context. Norms are not laws: they live in a group's collective consciousness and are enforced by social pressure (approval, disapproval, inclusion, exclusion) rather than courts. Because they are shared expectations, norms vary across cultures, eras, and groups — what is normal in one context is deviant in another.
Norms can be descriptive (what people actually do — "most people tip 20%") or injunctive (what people should do). The MCAT cares more about injunctive norms because they carry moral weight and connect to sanctions and deviance.
Quick check: A student notices that everyone in the library whispers, so she whispers too even though no sign asks her to. Is she responding to a descriptive norm, an injunctive norm, or both?
Answer: Both. The observed behavior (everyone whispering) is descriptive, but she also senses an injunction — "you should be quiet in libraries." Most real norms blend both.
Sanctions
Must knowA sanction is any reward or punishment used to enforce social norms. Sanctions are bidirectional — they punish deviance and reward conformity — and fall along two dimensions:
| Positive (reward) | Negative (punishment) | |
|---|---|---|
| Formal | Award, medal, official recognition | Arrest, fine, imprisonment, license revocation |
| Informal | Smile, applause, compliment, inclusion | Gossip, shunning, ridicule, exclusion |
Formal sanctions come from recognized authorities (courts, employers, licensing boards); informal sanctions arise spontaneously from individuals and groups and are often felt most acutely in daily life.
Quick check: A physician who performs an illegal procedure loses their medical license. A colleague who spots them cheating at poker rolls their eyes. Classify each.
Answer: Losing the license is a formal negative sanction; the eye-roll is an informal negative sanction.
Folkways, Mores, and Taboos
Must knowWilliam Graham Sumner classified norms by their moral weight along a spectrum from mildly awkward to morally horrifying.
- Folkways — everyday conventions whose violation produces mild disapproval but no moral outrage (wearing the wrong clothes, eating with hands in Western contexts). Breaking one makes you seem rude or odd, not bad.
- Mores (MOR-ayz) — norms tied to core moral values; violation provokes genuine moral condemnation (infidelity, embezzlement). Many, but not all, are codified into law.
- Taboos — the strongest category; violation is considered unthinkable or profoundly disturbing (cannibalism, incest). Every culture has them, though the content differs.
Memory anchor: Folkways → faux pas; Mores → Moral breach; Taboos → the unthinkable.
Quick check: Someone eats dessert before their entrée at a dinner party — guests find it quirky. Later, a guest is caught stealing money from the host — everyone is morally outraged. Classify each.
Answer: Eating dessert first is a folkway violation; stealing from the host is a mores violation.
Anomie
Must knowAnomie is a societal state of normlessness — what happens when rapid social change (revolution, economic crisis, mass migration, technological disruption) shreds the shared expectations people relied on, leaving them without a moral compass.
Émile Durkheim developed the concept (Suicide, 1897), observing that suicide rates rose during both economic depressions and booms: rapid change disrupts social regulation, removing clear norms to guide behavior. Anomie matters because it bridges social structure and individual behavior — deviance rises not just from poverty but from a destabilized social structure.
Robert Merton later adapted anomie into Strain Theory (below), but Durkheim's version is specifically about norm breakdown at the societal level.
Quick check: A country undergoes sudden economic collapse; crime, suicide, and social unrest all rise. A sociologist attributes this to the erosion of shared norms. Which concept?
Answer: Anomie (Durkheim).
Deviance
Must knowDeviance is any behavior, belief, or characteristic that violates social norms and invites disapproval or sanction. Three key features:
- Deviance is relative — it depends on the norm, which varies by culture, context, and time. (Homosexuality was once in the DSM as a disorder, removed in 1973; today it is not considered deviant in most Western contexts.) Deviance is socially constructed, not an objective property of the act.
- Deviance is not the same as crime — crime is legal deviance; much deviance is noncriminal (rudeness, unusual beliefs).
- Deviance can be positive — norm violations that are admired (a whistleblower exposing fraud).
Stigma (Goffman) is a deeply discrediting attribute that reduces a person "from a whole and usual person to a tainted, discounted one." Stigma is the mechanism that links a deviant label to real social exclusion: once an attribute (a record, a diagnosis, a visible disability) is marked as discrediting, the person is treated differently and may internalize a spoiled identity.
Quick check: A punk musician dresses in torn clothing and spikes their hair in a way that offends mainstream society but earns status within the punk subculture. Is this deviant?
Answer: It depends on the reference group — deviant to mainstream society, conformist within the subculture. This illustrates the relativity of deviance.
Perspectives on Deviance
Must knowThis is the most heavily tested part of the unit: the MCAT gives a scenario and asks which theory best explains it. Know each theory's core logic, key theorist(s), and typical application.
Differential Association Theory
Must knowEdwin Sutherland: deviance is learned through social interaction, especially within intimate groups. People become criminals not from poverty or defect but because they associate with others who define law-breaking favorably and learn the techniques and rationalizations from them. Core principle: if a person's associations provide more definitions favorable to law violation than unfavorable, they offend. This is a social-learning model — deviance is taught, not innate — and works best for subcultural crime (gangs, white-collar crime).
Quick check: A teenager grows up where older peers celebrate shoplifting and teach kids how to avoid detectors. She begins shoplifting. Which theory?
Answer: Differential Association Theory (Sutherland).
Labeling Theory
Must knowLabeling theory asks not "why do people commit deviant acts?" but "why do some acts and people get labeled deviant while others don't?" Deviance is a property of the social reaction, not the act (Becker, Outsiders, 1963; Lemert). Two key terms:
- Primary deviance — an initial norm violation that doesn't alter self-concept (most people speed or drink underage without becoming "deviant").
- Secondary deviance — deviance that occurs because someone was publicly labeled. The person internalizes the label, others treat them as deviant, and they are pushed into a deviant career — a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Becker added moral entrepreneurs (those who campaign to have behaviors defined as deviant) and stressed that labeling reflects power — dominant groups define the rules and apply labels to less powerful ones.
Quick check: A teenager is caught stealing once and gets a record. Teachers watch him, peers avoid him, employers won't hire him; he joins a gang and his offenses escalate. Which theory explains the escalation?
Answer: Labeling Theory (Becker/Lemert) — the label created secondary deviance.
Strain Theory
Must knowRobert Merton (1938): American culture promotes the same goals (wealth, the "American Dream") for everyone but does not give everyone equal legitimate means to reach them. This gap creates strain, which produces deviance. Merton's five adaptations:
| Adaptation | Goals? | Means? | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Conformity | ✓ | ✓ | Works within the system; most people |
| Innovation | ✓ | ✗ | Accepts goals, uses illegitimate means (e.g., drug dealing) |
| Ritualism | ✗ | ✓ | Abandons goals, follows rules rigidly (going-through-the-motions bureaucrat) |
| Retreatism | ✗ | ✗ | Abandons both (chronic drug use, withdrawal) |
| Rebellion | new | new | Rejects existing goals/means, substitutes new ones (revolutionaries) |
Innovation is the most tested (explains most property crime and drug dealing). Ritualism is the trickiest — behavior looks compliant, but the person has psychologically abandoned the goals.
Quick check: A first-gen college student wants financial success but can't find legitimate work, so she sells counterfeit goods online. Which adaptation?
Answer: Innovation — accepts the goal (success), substitutes an illegitimate means (Merton's strain theory).
OptionalDifferential opportunity theory (Cloward & Ohlin) extends strain by noting that illegitimate means are also unequally distributed.
Functionalist View: Durkheim on the Functions of Deviance
Must knowBeyond anomie, Durkheim argued deviance is normal and even necessary: it clarifies and reaffirms moral boundaries (punishment reminds everyone where the lines are), promotes social cohesion (shared outrage unites the community), and encourages social change (today's deviance — e.g., civil-rights protest — can become tomorrow's norm).
Conflict View of Deviance
Know the logicConflict theory frames deviance through power: laws and the deviant label are created by and serve dominant groups; behaviors threatening the powerful are disproportionately criminalized, while elite harms (white-collar/corporate wrongdoing) are under-sanctioned. This complements Becker's point that labeling reflects power.
Social Control Theory
Must knowTravis Hirschi's Social Control Theory (1969) asks "why do most people conform?" Answer: social bonds — attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief. When bonds weaken, deviance follows. Sometimes tested in passages comparing it to strain theory.
Aspects of Collective Behavior
Must knowCollective behavior is relatively spontaneous, unstructured activity by large numbers of people that falls outside normal social routines — a space where ordinary norms are suspended or unclear.
Know the logicCrowd theories. Deindividuation — the loss of individual identity and self-restraint in a crowd, making people susceptible to suggestion (linked to Le Bon's early "crowd mind"/contagion theory, and to Zimbardo's Stanford Prison Experiment). Two theories correct the view that crowds are simply irrational:
- Convergence theory — the crowd doesn't create extreme behavior; like-minded people who already share a disposition converge in one place, so the crowd reflects pre-existing tendencies.
- Emergent norm theory (Turner & Killian) — crowds aren't normless; because the situation is ambiguous, a new norm emerges through a few prominent members and is adopted by the rest, explaining why different crowds behave differently.
Forms of collective behavior:
- Fad — a behavior or interest that spreads rapidly, enjoys brief intense popularity, then disappears (fidget spinners, viral challenges).
- Fashion — similar but more enduring and socially embedded; evolves gradually rather than vanishing. The MCAT distinction is mainly duration: fads brief, fashions longer-lived.
- Rumor — unverified information spread informally, often filling a void of trustworthy information; shapes how crowds interpret ambiguous situations and fuels panics and hysteria.
- Panic — sudden, fearful, disorganized collective flight from a perceived threat (a stampede toward exits during a fire).
- Mass hysteria (mass psychogenic illness) — large numbers share a belief or develop physical symptoms with no external physical cause; symptoms are real but spread through social contagion (Salem witch trials; factory-illness outbreaks with no detectable toxin).
- Riot — collective public disorder, violence, or destruction, often triggered by a specific event amid underlying tension; ordinary norms against violence break down (partly deindividuation, partly normlessness). A politically motivated riot is sometimes called a rebellion.
Moral panics (Stanley Cohen) — society treats a perceived threat as far more dangerous than evidence warrants, amplified by media, often targeting a scapegoated folk devil. Social movements — organized, sustained efforts to promote or resist change; more structured than other collective behavior.
Quick check: One student reports feeling dizzy and nauseated after smelling something strange; within an hour, fifteen others report the same symptoms, but investigation finds no toxin. What is this?
Answer: Mass hysteria (mass psychogenic illness) — symptoms spread through social contagion.
Common Confusions & Tricks
1. Mores vs. folkways. Mores is pronounced MOR-ayz and carries Moral weight; folkways are mild.
2. Anomie (Durkheim) vs. Strain Theory (Merton). Society in chaos where norms dissolve → Durkheim's anomie. Someone turning to crime because they can't access legitimate paths to success → Merton's strain theory.
3. Primary vs. secondary deviance. Primary = the initial act; secondary = what happens after being labeled (the label itself causes more deviance). A record or diagnosis leading to more deviance → secondary deviance.
4. Differential Association vs. Social Learning. Differential Association (Sutherland) IS a social-learning model for deviance — don't confuse it with Bandura's general theory. Learning criminal behavior from intimate associates → Sutherland.
5. Formal vs. informal sanctions — direction matters. Both positive and negative sanctions can be formal or informal. A Nobel Prize = formal positive; a friend's praise = informal positive. Memorize the four-cell table.
6. Conformity vs. Ritualism (Merton). Conformity accepts goals AND means (genuinely pursuing success). Ritualism follows the rules mechanically but has abandoned the goal — the burnt-out bureaucrat → ritualism.
7. Taboo ≠ merely embarrassing. Taboos evoke visceral disgust (cannibalism, incest); merely awkward violations are folkways.
8. Riots vs. moral panics. A riot is actual collective violence; a moral panic is exaggerated societal fear amplified by media. Media fear and overreaction → moral panic; actual crowd violence → riot.
Key Theories & Terms
| Term / Theorist | What it means |
|---|---|
| Social norm | A shared, unwritten expectation about appropriate behavior in a social context. |
| Sanction | Any reward or punishment used to enforce norms; formal/informal and positive/negative. |
| Folkways | Mild, everyday norms; violation produces mild disapproval, no moral outrage (Sumner). |
| Mores | Norms tied to core moral values; violation provokes moral condemnation (Sumner). |
| Taboos | The most severe norms; violation is considered unthinkable or disturbing (Sumner). |
| William Graham Sumner | Classified norms into folkways, mores, and taboos. |
| Anomie | A societal state of normlessness from rapid social change (Durkheim). |
| Émile Durkheim | Introduced anomie; studied social integration; deviance as functional (Suicide, 1897). |
| Deviance | Any behavior/belief/characteristic that violates social norms and invites disapproval. |
| Stigma (Goffman) | A deeply discrediting attribute; links a deviant label to real social exclusion. |
| Primary deviance | An initial norm violation that doesn't substantially alter self-concept (Lemert). |
| Secondary deviance | Deviance resulting from being labeled; the label becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy (Lemert). |
| Howard Becker / Edwin Lemert | Labeling theory; primary vs. secondary deviance; moral entrepreneurs (Becker). |
| Moral entrepreneur | One who campaigns to have behaviors defined as deviant (Becker). |
| Differential Association Theory | Deviance is learned through interaction with intimate associates holding pro-deviant definitions (Sutherland). |
| Edwin Sutherland | Developed Differential Association Theory. |
| Strain Theory | Deviance arises from the gap between cultural goals and unequal legitimate means (Merton). |
| Robert Merton | Strain Theory and its five adaptations: conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism, rebellion. |
| Innovation / Ritualism / Retreatism / Rebellion | Merton's deviant adaptations (see table). |
| Differential opportunity theory | Extension: illegitimate means are also unequally distributed (Cloward & Ohlin). |
| Functions of deviance (Durkheim) | Deviance is normal/functional: clarifies boundaries, promotes cohesion, encourages change. |
| Conflict view of deviance | Laws and deviant labels serve dominant groups; elite harms are under-sanctioned. |
| Social Control Theory | Conformity is maintained by social bonds (attachment, commitment, involvement, belief); deviance follows weak bonds (Hirschi). |
| Collective behavior | Spontaneous, unstructured activity by large groups outside normal routines. |
| Fad / Fashion | Fad spreads fast and vanishes; fashion is more enduring and gradual. |
| Rumor | Unverified information spread informally; fuels other collective behavior. |
| Panic | Sudden, fearful, disorganized collective flight from a perceived threat. |
| Mass hysteria | Spread of symptoms/beliefs with no physical cause; driven by social contagion. |
| Riot | Collective disorder with public violence, often triggered by an event amid social tension. |
| Moral panic / Folk devil | Exaggerated media-amplified societal fear; targets a scapegoated group (Stanley Cohen). |
| Deindividuation | Loss of individual identity and self-restraint in a crowd. |
| Contagion / Convergence / Emergent norm theory | Crowd theories: Le Bon's "crowd mind"; pre-existing dispositions converge; new situational norm emerges (Turner & Killian). |