Comments on: He Who Cast the First Stone Probably Didn’t http://www.lawsocietyblog.com/archives/252 Notes from the intersection of law, society, technology, economics, and culture Thu, 04 Dec 2008 06:16:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.2 By: Ben Samuel Nelson http://www.lawsocietyblog.com/archives/252#comment-2518 Ben Samuel Nelson Sat, 29 Jul 2006 01:54:46 +0000 http://www.lawsocietyblog.com/archives/252#comment-2518 Yeah, it's kind of spooky how Benjamin N Nelson's research interests are identical to my own (or at least, are very similar). No doubt the Freakonomists Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner would find it <a href="http://www.freakonomics.com/blog/2006/07/19/what-was-putrid-mountain-already-taken/" rel="nofollow">anomalous</a>. (I should correct myself, I just checked my soc text and it tells me that the "deviance amplifying process", to use soc jargon, is when people intentionally do the opposite of what they're socialized to do, a kind of reverse psychology. That's not the same as the labelling theory which you're discussing.) I believe the labelling theory is plausible. After a fashion, the Zimbardo / Stanford experiments seem to lend some support to the possibility. It would be interesting to hear what the consensus is among social psychologists, if any. (I'm doubtful; my impressions so far are that social psychology as a discipline is clique-driven.) Yeah, it’s kind of spooky how Benjamin N Nelson’s research interests are identical to my own (or at least, are very similar). No doubt the Freakonomists Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner would find it anomalous.

(I should correct myself, I just checked my soc text and it tells me that the “deviance amplifying process”, to use soc jargon, is when people intentionally do the opposite of what they’re socialized to do, a kind of reverse psychology. That’s not the same as the labelling theory which you’re discussing.)

I believe the labelling theory is plausible. After a fashion, the Zimbardo / Stanford experiments seem to lend some support to the possibility. It would be interesting to hear what the consensus is among social psychologists, if any. (I’m doubtful; my impressions so far are that social psychology as a discipline is clique-driven.)

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