The Co-Construction of Non-Normative Identities: What Stigma, Labeling, and Othering Theory Have Underemphasized

The term “symbolic interaction” was coined in 1936 by Herbert Blumer to represent the unique qualities of interactions that take place between individuals. Social reality is an interpretation according to each individual based on the process of continuing interactions, thus allowing for multiple realities. This school of thought, originally developed by George Herbert Mead, provides a foundation for labeling theory in criminology. The labeling process of “making the criminal” began to be fully explored in the 1950s and 1960s, with work by Edwin Lemert, Howard Becker, Edwin Schur, and others. While social scientists tended to distance themselves from labeling theory in the early 1970s, the labeling concept was not abandoned altogether. Labeling is considered as one part of a larger social process, exemplified in John Braithwaite's reintegrative shaming theory. Ross Matsueda has used a reflective appraisal approach to explain how labeling can influence subsequent deviance. One of the most contemporary developments in labeling theory can be found in Robert Sampson and John Laub's theory of age‐graded informal social control. Results from the most current research on labeling theory appear to be trending toward support for the theory.

Labeling theory is a vibrant area of research and theoretical development within the field of criminology. Originating in the mid- to late-1960s in the United States at a moment of tremendous political and cultural conflict, labeling theorists brought to center stage the role of government agencies, and social processes in general, in the creation of deviance and crime. The theory represented both a theoretical and methodological break from the past, and it could reasonably be argued that it was one of the dominant theoretical perspectives in the study of crime and deviance from the late 1960s until the early 1980s. It was also responsible for spurring countless empirical studies over this time period. Although there were periods when interest in labeling process was in decline, particularly after 1985, labeling theory has had a bit of a resurgence in recent years. Labeling theory has become part of a more general criminological theory of sanctions that includes deterrence theory’s focus on the crime reduction possibilities of sanctions, procedural justice theory’s focus on the importance of the manner in which sanctions are imposed, and defiance/reintegrative theory’s emphasis on individual differences in the social bond and persons’ emotional reaction to the label. Labeling theories of crime are often referred to as social reaction theories, because they focus primarily on the consequences of responses or reactions to crime. These responses or reactions typically focus on three sets of actors: (1) informal social others, such as the friends, parents, or partners of persons committing crimes, and who disapprove of the offender’s behavior; (2) organizations or institutions such as the criminal justice system, whose function it is to “do something about” crime; and (3) those who perceive a threat by some behavior and want to see legislation passed to outlaw it. All of these very diverse actions have one thing in common: they are all reactions to crime. As such, they are said to be “labels” because they have the quality of attaching a name or a signature to someone or some behavior—hence the name “labeling theory.” From this, labeling theory can be understood as involving two main hypotheses. First is the status characteristics hypothesis, which states that labels are imposed in part because of the status of those doing the labeling and those being labeled. The second is the secondary deviance hypothesis, which essentially argues that deviant labels create problems that the one being labeled must adjust to and deal with, and that under certain conditions labels can lead to greater involvement in crime and deviance.

The desire for university education after years of dictatorship reached unprecedented heights in Spain as education appeared to ensure a secure future, especially for the generation born after the dictator years. As a member of the European Union, Spain experienced rapid infrastructural development and economic growth which necessitated the employment of qualified graduate labour. However, the economic collapse of 2014 made the labour force trained during the period of economic boom overqualified for the few, menial jobs available. As a result, there emerged economic and social conditions in Spain which made this affected group appear to have been ‘prepared’ for unemployment. In the course of time the expressions, (Pre)parados, mileurista, ni-ni used to describe this group found their way into everyday Spanish lexicon. This paper adopts two methods in the examination of these coinages. The first is a morpho-semantic analysis, while in the second, the theory of labelling and stigma is applied to highlight the psychological state of the young unemployed Spaniard. The findings reveal that labelling and stigmatisation of a group may come from the stigmatised group itself and may not necessarily be perceived as discriminatory when it also finds a general acceptance in society. The paper suggests that vocational education should be a substantial part of university education in a world of unpredictable economic dynamics.

Policy-makers and others historically have assumed that welfare programs should give assistance to the poor and carry stigma. This attitude in part developed from the English Poor Laws tradition in which poverty was considered a negative condition. Labeling theory has often been used to explain the process of welfare stigmatization. Once an individual is labeled as a deviant, such as a welfare recipient, a self-fulfilling prophecy is initiated. Others perceive and respond to the individual as a deviant and the individual also internalized the stigma attached to such a role. The stigma attached to public dependency becomes an outcome of this labeling process. This study identifies the relationship between welfare stigma and the elderly and has three objectives. First, it challenges the usefulness of labeling theory in explaining the perception of welfare stigma among elderly recipients. Second, it analyzes why different levels of stigma are attached to different public assistance programs. Third, it examines why some recipients feel more stigmatized than others. Historically, the elderly poor have heen identified as the deserving poor and provided for under most social programs. Because of differential treatment between the elderly poor and the able-bodied poor, this study contends that these groups develop different self-images as welfare recipients. A single welfare image applied indiscriminately to both groups results in a poor fit. Instead of internalizing the negative image from the outside community, the elderly may have internalized the deserving poor image and subsequently perceive their welfare status as less stigmatized. Congress established the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program in 1972 to replace the state-run Old Age Assistance (OAA) program. By placing SSI under the Social Security Administration, this new program seeks to provide additional income with less stigma to the aged poor. Data for this study come from two separate surveys: a local survey of 400 respondents and a national survey of 8600 respondents. The most important dependent variable in this study is welfare stigma. It is operationally defined by three indicators: 1) whether recipients feel bothered in receiving assistance; 2) whether recipients feel embarrassed to admit their welfare status; and 3) whether recipients perceive community disrespect for thier welfare status. Factor analysis enabled a welfare stigma index to be constructed using the above three items. The often cited welfare stigma was not substantiated by the data. Elderly recipients of both OOA and SSI had low stigma feelings. Labeling theory, while useful in explaining

This paper examines how the international media reporting on the monkeypox epidemic reinforces stereotypes about Africa and what this means for Africa in global power relations. How European and Western media depict Africa in their reporting of an epidemic creates and reinforces power dynamics and political bias along the lines of Africa being portrayed as a diseased-poor continent. The effect of these global inequalities is evident in the travel ban policies and the unequal distribution of vaccines. The concepts of hegemony, stigma, and labeling theory were used as theoretical approaches to analyze how foreign media hegemony creates and reinforces stereotypes about Africa through media reporting of an epidemic like the 2022 monkeypox virus. Online publications and tweets by Western and European media outlets were used as data to analyze foreign media hegemony while reporting the monkeypox outbreak in Europe and North America. As a counter-hegemony, African journalists reacted to foreign media agencies using African images to report disease outbreaks in the Global North. The conclusion and recommendation of this paper call for investment in African journalism to help Africa tell their own story and for African literature and researchers from Africa to contribute to global biomedical literature.

Background. The theory of stigma was popularized through research by sociologists M. Seeman and E. Goffman in the mid-1960s. The theoretical aspects of stigmatization presented in these works have made it possible to disseminate their results to different professions, including the teaching profession, and to construct a number of theoretical models of the processes of stigmatization of teachers. The component composition of such models is substantively based on theoretical studies carried out in the works of J.B. Pryor and G.D. Reeder. Research of this kind makes a significant contribution to stigma theory in terms of understanding that the processes of stigmatization of the educator’s personality can take different directions and how they are multidimensional; Societal perceptions of the teaching profession influence the level of stigmatization of the profession; acceptance of the stigma by the educator itself may result from an understanding of the social devaluation of the profession; Actors in a stigmatized pedagogical environment (such as family and friends) are at risk of social stigmatization; social institutions can perpetuate or exacerbate the stigmatized status of the teaching profession. Purpose. The article is aimed at presenting the theory of stigmatization of the teaching profession, as well as the development of an appropriate model and the analysis of its components, giving it qualitative certainty, reducing the risks of stigmatization and enhancing the value of the professional activity of the teachers Materials and methods. The practical and heuristic value of the study is that its findings broaden the existing understanding of the mechanisms of stigmatization and offer a productive tool for addressing the stigmatization of teaching professions in modern education, provide a vision of the key aspects to be further explored in this and related areas. The study used methods of comparative pedagogy, modeling method. Results. Based on the analysis of the scientific and methodical literature on the problem of stigmatization of individual professions, we proposed a model reflecting the basic concepts of the processes of stigmatization of the teaching profession in the field of education. The model identified the following main components: social stigma, self-stigma, associative stigma, structural stigma, primary and secondary personality relationships of the educator and learner. Social stigma is a key component of stigmatizing the teaching profession and underpins the subsequent components we have identified in this model. They also summarized the materials and highlighted the provisions that should be included in the theory describing the processes of stigmatization in education. This contributes to reducing the influence of the stigma formed in relation to the educational process or the profession of the teacher, and can have a positive influence on the status of the teacher, his professional identity and relationship with the students.

Labeling in Interactional Practice: Applying Labeling Theory to Interactions and Interactional Analysis to Labeling

The distortion of images is especially problematic in films about disability (Saran 1998a; 1998b). Among films portraying characters with disabilities, psychiatric disabilities are portrayed more often than any other disability category (Byrd and Elliott 1985), and popular films depicting characters with illness often portray their symptoms inaccurately (Fleming and Manvell 1985). Negative images of people with illness (PWMI) in visual media such as television and film are ubiquitous (Wahl 1995), and the popularity of mental patient and asylum films has been explored (C. Smith 1999). Most disturbing is the linking of illness with homicidal behavior, a myth that appears frequently in horror films (Hyler, Gabbard, and Schneider 1991) and the plethora of films about serial killers. Other stereotypical media images suggest that PWMI are likely to be childlike, irresponsible, incompetent, unpredictable, dangerous, and unstable; often they have unusual appearances. These wide-eyed characters, often portrayed with unkempt clothing and wild hair, cannot be taken seriously (Wahl 1995). In this paper I discuss an exercise I use requiring students to view a popular film that portrays a particular disorder or a character with a disorder. Students analyze the film and write two papers, one about the sociological model of illness and a second about possible links between media images and the societal rejection or acceptance of people with illness. I begin with a description of necessary materials and how the films can be used, then discuss the assigned readings and classroom discussions of the sociological and medical models of illness, including suggestions for reading assignments. Next, I explain how popular films about illness can be categorized to maximize the exercise's utility for students' learning. I conclude with an evaluation of the exercise based on a pre-test/post-test comparison of students' knowledge of the theory and concepts of residual deviance, labeling, stereotype, and stigma.

Personal, work, and societal concerns about obesity and body fatness have triggered research on it across multiple domains. However, the organizational literature has been hampered by a significant shortcoming in considering it solely as an objective construct, despite research in other disciplines demonstrating a critical subjective component to how body fatness is experienced. To address this conceptual and theoretical challenge, we draw on stigma theory to explore the workplace implications of subjective fatness, or how big one feels in their own mind. We utilize and extend stigma theory by integrating it with medical research. In doing so, we shed new light on the subjective nature of the self‐devaluation process that occurs in stigmatized individuals. We argue that this self‐devaluation process is the mechanism by which subjective body fatness influences work performance. We test these hypotheses across three studies that constructively replicate results across multiple design types (multi‐rater, time‐lagged, & bivariate latent‐change model) and diverse geographic samples. Results consistently show that subjective fatness exerts a stronger impact on performance than objective fatness, and this influence is mediated by self‐devaluation. In all, our work indicates it is not how big one is but how big one feels that most affects work performance.

Stigma is experienced by former drug users who live in Kelurahan 24 Ilir Palembang. The occurrence of stigma due to the views and responses given by the community to former drug users. The object of this research is the community residing in Village 24 Ilir Palembang that has met the criteria for determining informants. The purpose of this study was to find out and understand the stigma of society towards former drug users in Kelurahan 24 Ilir Palembang and was studied using the stigma theory from Erving Goffman. This research was conducted by qualitative method with qualitative descriptive type. The main informants in the study numbered eight people and the supporting informants were three people. The data collection techniques performed in this study are with in-depth interviews, observations and documentation. The results showed that stigma comes from people's assessment of former drug users in the environment, which is then interpreted by society to be stigmatised. In Kelurahan 24 Ilir Palembang there are former drug users who have varied ages and jobs, the factors that encourage drug use are divided into two, namely social and occupational environmental factors. While users who have stopped using drugs due to several factors such as having been rehabilitated, stopped on their own will or have a family. The stigma process that occurs in Kelurahan 24 Ilir Palembang starts from the association of former drug users to their environment, after which there is a public opinion about former drug users, then there is a stigma received by former drug users. The form of stigma in Kelurahan 24 Ilir Palembang is divided into four, namely former users feel blamed by the surrounding environment or feel viktimization, gossiped, ridiculed and a positive form that is given advice.

Labeling theory is a sociological and criminological approach to the study of deviance that focuses on the process of the social construction of crime. Labeling theorists attribute a major role to the social definition of the crime and to the process of labeling and stigmatization affecting deviant behavior: by assigning the label of criminal to an offender, a process is engaged that transforms the author of a single offense – or an occasional transgression – into a chronic offender. The core of deviant processes is clearly traceable to the rules that define a given conduct as right or wrong. No behavior is deviant in itself – it becomes so as soon as it is defined as such. The labeling approach therefore calls for serious thought on the power of groups within a society to define a certain behavior as deviant.

Drawing on categorization theory, semiotics, and labeling theory, we argue that categories and labels are widely utilized by individuals in organizational settings to help structure and simplify the social environment, primarily for reasons of understanding, consensus, and control. Based largely on such situational criteria as role and rank, people are sorted into various categories and are perceived and treated as exemplars or prototypes of the category. The labels attached to these categories coalesce when individuals triangulate their perceptions of category members with the perceptions that credible peers and powerholders have of category members. Labels distill a complex and perhaps contradictory array of data into concise and coherent packages, and thus provide a potent means of interpreting, representing, and conveying organizational experience and cuing action. However, labels are inherently arbitrary, labels cause individual category members to lose their individuality and assume the affective tone of the category, and labels tend to become reified as objective and normative accounts of social reality. The ubiquity and potency of labeling processes are illustrated with applications to individual-level (service encounters), group- level (intergroup conflict), and organization-level (identity, image, and reputation) phenomena. We speculate that both the process of labeling and the content of labels are similar across levels.

Despite renewed interests in the labeling perspective and the impact of official intervention on individuals' future outcomes, scant attention has been given to potential conditioning factors for theorized labeling processes. We argue that, when viewed through a symbolic interactionist lens, variations in the nature of primary social groups, through which individuals filter official labels like arrest, may generate patterns for subsequent self-concept and delinquency that are contrary to what labeling theory indicates. To test our rationale, we offer a moderated mediation model in which gang membership is expected to differentially impact the effect of arrest on future delinquency through an intermediary mechanism: self-esteem. We test a gang-nongang dichotomy and then probe further to test whether hypothesized effects are gang specific or occur similarly for nongang youths with highly delinquent peer groups. Analyzed using Rochester Youth Development Study (RYDS) data (N = 961), comparisons between gang members and nonaffiliated youths with similarly highly delinquent peer groups revealed no significant differences in conditional indirect effects of arrest on self-esteem and future delinquency; the two groups were similarly insulated from any negative impact of arrest on self-esteem. For nongang youths with fewer delinquent peers, however, arrest significantly reduced later self-esteem, which in turn increased their future delinquency.

Understanding the disparity in the amount of punishment between youth and adults, for violent and non-violent criminal activity, remains a matter of theoretical debate. In the present study, the research employs deterrence and labeling theory, through a life course theoretical framework, to assess the extent to which the punishments for violent and non-violent crimes follow different trajectories. The deterrence theory posits an individual will refrain and deter from future offending if the consequence of the crime committed outweighs the actual crime itself. The labeling theory focuses on the labels applied to an individual, and if that label influences the individual's behavior, and promotes future deviant behavior. The life course theory focuses on the connections made in an individual's life and predicts that early events one endures in life can predict their future decisions. This study utilizes the NCRP data set, which consists of questionnaires distributed to inmates in custody for the 2003 calendar year. These data show the amount of punishment given to youth and adults for the same type of crime. Disaggregating by offenses reveals, however, that youth are punished more severely for robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, and larceny. These findings raise questions about the definite effects of the deterrence and labeling process on crime progressions, and suggest the need to continue to investigate the theories that differentiate between youths and adults in relation to specific types of offending.

Despite the widespread popularity enjoyed by labeling theory less than a decade ago, it is now commonly asserted that societal reaction has little etiological impact on future deviancelcrime. The present study challenges this view and suggests that an accurate assessment of the perspective awaits the systematic investigation of the various contingencies involved in the labeling process. Using a random sample of Manhattan youths, a longitudinal analysis of the impact of formal intervention on juvenile delinquency/deviance was undertaken in which the relevance of two such contingencies was examined: types of reaction and types of deviance. The data revealed (I) that police and mental health intervention had both independent and interactive effects in increasing juvenile deviance and (2) that the impact of these various modes of reaction differed according to the form of juvenile deviance (delinquency, anxiety, general psychological impairment) being examined. It was thus concluded that it would be premature to discard the labeling perspective as an etiological theory of deviant/criminal behavior.