What if you would have been caught cheating in school?
You were copying answers from one of your friends. The teacher gave you an F and you had to repeat the class. In addition, from now on you have to inform every teacher that you are a cheater and the teacher will announce it in every class you take.
How would you feel?
How do you think this label would impact your educational experience and your life?
In an essay minimum of 400 words, write a response in terms of Social Process Theory.
Feel free to include additional resources to present your points either pro or con.
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Social Process Theories: Socialization and Society
Name
Institution
Date
Social Process Theories: Socialization and Society
Social press theory shows how criminality is a function of people’s interactions with different institutions, organizations, and processes in society. Therefore, anyone has the potential of becoming a criminal by maintaining destructive social relationships. Social press theory involves three main branches: first, the social learning theory emphasizes that people learn to be criminals as much as conventional behavior is learned. The second branch is the social control theory that analyzes society to have failed in controlling criminal tendencies. The third branch is labeling theory, which maintains that negatives’ labels are the ones that produce criminal careers (Becker, 2018).
If I was caught cheating or rather copying answers from a friend in school and the teacher gives me an F. I also have to repeat classes and inform all teachers that I’m a cheater and the teacher also announces that in every class I take, I would even transfer because I would feel bad and later get into a depression. The act of copying is against the school’s regulations, and it is, therefore, punishable. Some reasons could explain my actions: maybe I just wanted to get the grade, and I don’t care about education. The second reason could be the mentality that if I cheat, I can only be affecting myself, and the third reason could be that the subject teacher is not good, and so to get by that class, I have to cheat.
Getting an F, being told to repeat class, informing every teacher that I am a cheater and teachers having to announce that I cheated in every class I take are the consequences or punishment I receive. There are also future consequences that can happen, including facing copyright infringement troubles whereby I can be sued for copying a paper. I could also lose my scholarship if I had one or not get a chance to have one, and I would also lack a good recommendation when applying for a job after school. These consequences have a negative impact since everyone will lose respect for me. It hurts my self-esteem, prevents me from thinking critically in solving any issue, and developing a warped sense of morality.
The social control theory, a branch of the social press theory, is based on everyday activities. I can choose to cheat on an exam or do my work, which depends on self-control. Several studies regarding social control theory involve measures of the role of school attachment and support given in young people’s lives (Mamayek, Paternoster & Loughran, 2017). Students that are reported to like school and those that care about the teacher’s opinions are likely not to be delinquent. That is regardless of the delinquency measurement. Also, family attachment plays a role in the child’s socialization, and it helps to maintain the child’s subsequent conformity to the society rules. The teacher also labels me a cheater, which relates to the labeling theory. Labeling theory explains that a person or a child becomes what he is described.
In conclusion, the mostly used self-reported delinquency is whether the parents are aware of where and what they are doing when they are not home. The same applies to cheat in exams. It is a matter of a personal decision that is influenced by these two attachments mostly. I would slowly start exhibiting a thief or a cheater’s actions, behaviors, and attitudes since the teacher labeled me a cheater for copying somebody else’s work. He is not supposed to force the identity on me like that, and it is very wrong. That shows that the law is enforced in discriminatory ways and the crime statistics are more of a record of control agents’ activities than of criminals.
References
Mamayek, C., Paternoster, R., & Loughran, T. A. (2017). Self-control as self-regulation: a return to control theory. Deviant behavior, 38(8), 895-916.
Becker, H. S. (2018). Labeling theory reconsidered 1. In Deviance and social control (pp. 41-66). Routledge.
