Exam-style question
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Which distinction best separates crime, deviance, social order and social control in an A-Level Sociology answer?.
- A.Keep treating crime and deviance as the same concept out of the answer by distinguishing the concepts explicitly.
- B.Explaining crime patterns without linking them to class, gender, ethnicity or social control.
- C.Making a moral judgement instead of using sociological theory or evidence.
- D.Write a broad opinion about Crime and Deviance without sociological theory, evidence, method or AO focus.
Model answer
What a good answer should say
- The correct answer is Keep treating crime and deviance as the same concept out of the answer by distinguishing the concepts explicitly..
- The correct answer distinguishes legal rules, social norms, social order and social control, then evaluates the distinction using theory, evidence and research-method limits.
Explanation
Why this works
The crucial distinction is that crime is legally defined, deviance is normatively defined, social order is the stable pattern of social life, and social control is the process that secures conformity. AO1 should state those differences clearly.
AO2 should show how a family, school, workplace, media organisation or criminal justice agency applies sanctions or rewards. AO3 evaluation should compare consensus, conflict and interactionist theory, and can use research methods such as observation, interviews or official statistics to judge whether evidence validly shows conformity or control.
This explanation is concept-specific: it deals with definitions and mechanisms of control rather than the empirical distribution of crime across social groups.
Common mistake
No common mistake is linked to this question yet.