AQA GCSE Sociology: Crime, Deviance and Social Stratification — Revision Notes

Condensed for the final weeks. For the full explanation, use the Crime, Deviance and Social Stratification study guide, or for practice questions with worked answers, see the Crime, Deviance and Social Stratification practice questions.

Build one grid, not eighteen separate topics

Both sections repeatedly ask you to apply functionalist, Marxist, feminist and (for crime) interactionist perspectives to named issues. Build a single grid — four perspectives down one side, each issue (crime, social control, class, poverty, power) across the top — rather than revising each combination as an isolated fact.

Section 3.5: crime and deviance — key names

Theorist	Perspective	Key idea
Merton	Functionalist	Anomie explains causes of crime
Becker	Interactionist	Labelling theory
Heidensohn	Feminist	Female conformity in patriarchal societies
Cohen	—	Delinquent subcultures
Carlen	Feminist	Women, crime and poverty

Crime vs deviance: not identical — deviance is broader; a deviant act need not be illegal.

Section 3.6: stratification — key names

Theorist	Perspective	Key idea
Davis and Moore	Functionalist	Stratification allocates roles by rewarding performance
Marx	Marxist	Class = ownership of the means of production
Weber	—	Class + status + party as separate dimensions
Townsend	—	Relative deprivation (poverty)
Murray	New Right	Underclass theory
Walby	Feminist	Patriarchy and power relationships

Marx vs Weber: do not use interchangeably — Marx centres on ownership; Weber adds status and party as genuinely separate dimensions.

Worked example: functionalist vs Marxist on stratification

FUNCTIONALIST (Davis and Moore):  stratification is necessary and
    beneficial -- society allocates able people to important roles by
    rewarding them, motivating competition for demanding positions
MARXIST:                          stratification exists because the
    bourgeoisie owns the means of production and exploits the
    proletariat -- inequality serves the powerful, not society as a
    whole
COMPARISON:                       functionalism treats inequality as a
    fair outcome of meritocratic competition; Marxism treats it as the
    product of unequal ownership a "fair" competition never actually
    offered

A weak answer describes one theory then the other without ever setting them side by side to state what they specifically disagree about.

Life chances and power relationships

Both 3.6.3 (Life chances) and 3.6.6 (Power relationships) examine the same set of social variables — class, gender, race/ethnicity, sexuality, age, disability, religion/belief — applied to two different questions: what opportunities a person has in life, and how power is distributed and exercised. Revise these two sub-topics as a pair, using the same variable list for both, rather than treating them as unconnected content, since exam questions can ask you to apply a single variable (for example, gender) to either life chances or power relationships depending on the question set.

Formal and informal social control

Distinguish formal social control (written rules, designated institutions with power to punish — courts, police, law) from informal social control (unwritten expectation and social reaction — approval, gossip, family/peer pressure). Heidensohn’s work on female conformity specifically links informal social control to patriarchal expectations placed on women, connecting section 3.5’s social control content directly to feminist theory used elsewhere in the specification.

Exam traps

• Treating “crime” and “deviance” as identical terms.
• Using Marx’s and Weber’s views on class interchangeably.
• Confusing the “dark figure” of crime with the crime rate itself.
• Describing poverty using only the culture-of-poverty explanation without contrasting material deprivation, which the specification treats as a genuine theoretical dispute.

Data on crime: the dark figure

Section 3.5.4 tests understanding of how useful official crime statistics actually are. The “dark figure” of crime refers to unreported and unrecorded crime — the gap between crimes that actually occur and those captured in official data. Sources of this gap include victims not reporting (fear, embarrassment, believing police won’t act) and police discretion in recording. A strong answer explains why this gap means official statistics may understate the true crime rate, rather than simply naming the term without explaining its consequence for data reliability.

Poverty as a social issue

Contrast the culture of poverty (poverty is perpetuated by learned attitudes and behaviours passed between generations) with material deprivation (poverty results from a genuine lack of economic resources, not attitudes) — the specification treats this as a live theoretical dispute, not a settled question. Townsend’s relative deprivation work and Murray’s underclass/New Right theory sit on opposite sides of this debate and are commonly asked to be compared directly.

Linking crime and stratification as one theme

Although crime and stratification appear as separate headline topics, the specification frequently connects them: theories explaining social class inequality (Marxism, functionalism, the New Right) are also used to explain why crime rates differ across class groups. Revising the two topics side by side — rather than in isolation — makes it easier to answer synoptic questions that ask you to apply a single sociological perspective across both areas of content in one extended answer.

Self-test

1. Distinguish crime from deviance.
2. Name the theorist associated with labelling theory, and their perspective.
3. What is the key difference between Marx’s and Weber’s accounts of class?
4. What is the “dark figure” of crime?
5. Name the two contrasting explanations of poverty the specification requires.

Answers: 1. Deviance is broader than crime — a deviant act need not be illegal, while crime specifically breaks the law. 2. Becker, interactionist. 3. Marx centres class on ownership of the means of production alone; Weber adds status and party as separate, additional dimensions of stratification. 4. The gap between crimes that actually occur and those that are officially recorded or reported — unreported and unrecorded crime. 5. The culture-of-poverty explanation and the material-deprivation explanation.