On the relation between group theory, demography and deviance

Humans, apart from a few odd exceptions, are a grouping species; we possess a
communitarian instinct that forces us to create bonds with other individuals. The reasons
for this may lie in the distinctive evolution process our kind went through, but still, our
connexion to the group goes beyond the mere efforts for survival. We do not create groups
just out of the need for help in finding our sustainment; “we” is a concept built with others
stemming from a deeper link between us all. Individual life is configured and modified by
the relations to others. Sociology takes great interest in these dynamics, there is a whole
“group theory” or “group theories” trying to explain the details surrounding this natural
behaviour in our species.

Human groups are then an object of study, and as such they are measurable and statistically
understandable, the correlation between numbers and the deep questions surrounding the
individual response to group affectation are also of Sociology’s interest. Demography deals
with the numeric understanding of society, putting into easily accountable terms some of
the complex phenomena originated by humans.

Groups create normality, some sort of order within the group, that is verifiable through
statistics, but there is also place for the abnormality, whether it is an odd “look” or a crime,
the rules imposed by society create rebelliousness as well. These concepts allow the social
scientist, the sociologist in this case, to analyse different events intertwined by individuals.
The purpose of this paper is to clear some of the basic ideas regarding groups (as a
sociological concept), demography and deviance and to mark the link between these three
subjects.

First then, what is a group? In a broad definition it could be said that a group is the name
given to a number of individuals sharing some features that allow them to identify and
interact with one another. There is a special cohesiveness that makes a group, from values
and interests to ethno-linguistic background and blood ties; not any collection of
individuals counts as a group, although any aggregate is likely to exhibit some of the
characteristics of a social group.

Self identification is very important when determining whether to give or not the status of
“group”, when an individual finds himself attached to the group in identitary basis it means
belonging to the group has changed his overview of society and of himself. We grow
accustomed to groups in society, as a matter of fact, groups make society more easily
understandable because they allow us to categorize and adequate social behaviour to the
group dynamics.

As said before, groups modify the way we see others and ourselves, and they modify as
well the way in which we interact with others; this is because groups alter our
understanding of others both belonging and not-belonging to the group. Social Identity
Theory, as formulated by Henri Tajfel and John Turner, seeks to thoroughly understand the
psychological basis that supports intergroup discrimination. The elements composing social
identities are:
Categorization, seen as the ability and practice of selecting the belonging to a group as an
identification-tool for an individual; so that we may call “a Buddhist, a Muslim, an Asian,
a cabdriver” that, while these epithets don’t comprise the full extent of that person’s
personality, his belonging to those groups helps us tell something about him. In the same
way, we can say things about ourselves by selecting certain names for the groups we belong
to; whether it refers to our job, our family, our ethnicity or etc.

Identification refers to the understanding about how our group memberships interact with
our vision of self, so that while sometimes we act and see ourselves as part of a group, other
times we do so as a unique individual. This makes a double personality that is in fact one
with two layers, the one regarding the group is our social identity (that is a part of ourselves
truly) and the individual one is our personal identity. In a parallel view, identification deals
with how we see others within our groups as identical to ourselves, they are a part of “us”
and don’t constitute a “them”.

Comparison, deals with how our self-concept fluctuates regarding the competitive nature of
our groups, given that we see ourselves in a positive light thanks to our groups or that we
seek to put our group at a close level from another, prestigious group.

Groups then form social ties with those three elements in mind but with many other
variables too, as for example whether it is a primary or secondary group (one marked by
concern for one another and tight relationships or one marked by a particular goal and
usually loose links between members) or how deeply does it affect our behaviour in terms
of conformity with group guidelines or if it facilitates or decreases our performance.

Many groups and individuals interacting simultaneously form social networks that work
beneath a fully societal level but still compose part of a society. There’s a proposed number
that limits a fully functional social network where members know each other and are able
to recall information about others, it’s called the Dunbar number and lies from 120 to 230
with 150 being usually accepted. What happens with modern societies made out of millions
and millions? They’re a collection of social networking, grouping and other forms of
human aggregates.

With this thought regarding the numeric repercussions of group theory we enter to the
second phase of this paper, dealing with demographics.

Demography is the study of human population dynamics in numeric terms. It studies the
size, structure and distribution of populations, as well as the changes produced within
populations at a given time. These analyses can relate to populations (societies) as whole or
smaller levels (networks, groups).
Demographic data serves as a counterargument or argumentative tool to different theories
and is thus an important part of sociology’s claims. Like sociology, the scientific reflexions
on population statistics come from the industrial and scientific revolutions of the XIX
century. The main source for this data are wide-encompassing surveys known as census,
that appeared first to help with taxation and to calculate political representation but that
now have many different uses. Taking interest in the dynamics of change in human
populations, demography takes special attention in some indicators for this. Fertility and
mortality, related to the birth rate and death rate of a society at a given time. Demography
also deals with the age of the population, its health and education conditions and the
relationship between population growth and the resources available.

Countries seem to go through what is called the “demographic transition” in which relating
to the economic advances of the society, the trends in the proportion of birth rates and death
rates change. First death rate drops due to development in different stages (healthcare and
nutrition for example), then population grows, later birth rates drop as well and population
growth overall stagnates. Overpopulation comes as a constant interest with demographic
studies, from the XIX century to our days it shows to create great unrest when thinking of
the results it can have. They range from child poverty, to unemployment, to increased crime
rates and so on. Underpopulation on the other hand is a very recent fear stemming from the
post-industrial societies that have gone through the “demographic transition”, these
societies will have to find ways to induce a new change in their demographic situation or
supply themselves with immigration in order to maintain economic growth.

Urbanization is another focus of demographic and sociologic interest, because it changes

the population dynamics while at the same time producing new interactions and situations
of sociological interest. The switch from rural to urban comes usually thanks to tough
economic conditions and the relative immobility of rural life, whereas cities provide a
constantly changing environment where social mobility and wealth accumulation is not
only possible but expected. Unfortunately urbanization carries great dangers both
economical and environmental, because as cities develop the workforce can become
excessive and jobs can suffer from a shortage, while real estate prices increase; if to this we
add the pollution and increased density of waste produced by big agglomerations, there’s a
crisis situation constantly taking place in cities.
This is where discontent and reaction occurs, whether positive or negative, there’s a
contestation to norms and regulations, deviance is thus a key concept when studying the
dynamics in an urban environment.

Deviance is the behaviour that challenges social normality, or more exactly, cultural norms.
There is formal and informal deviance; formal deviance is equivalent to crime, for it is the
violation of established, written norms, laws. Informal deviance is quite wide, it
encompasses all acts that challenge cultural norms not codified into laws, they can range
from dressing codes to manners of speech, and this kind of deviance depends greatly on the
culture one is studying.

There are different theoretical approaches to explain deviance, from the typological to the
apologetic. The typology of deviance proposed by Merton takes two criteria; the adherence
to cultural goals and the belief of how to attain goals, from higher or lower rankings in
these two variables, he suggests five possibilities: conformity (where one accepts cultural
goals and the means to attain them), innovation (where one accepts cultural goals but does
not accept the traditional means to accept them), ritualism (where one no longer cares
about cultural goals but keeps abiding the means as a ritual), retreatism (where one doesn’t
care about cultural goals nor the means for them) and finally rebellion (where new goals
and means are created).

The labelling theory proposes that deviant behaviour answers more to the adoption of a
label given by other members of society; the deviant individual first is ostracized and
labelled and afterwards begins adopting the labelled identity as a result. Structural-
functionalism argues that deviance’s important for a society not only because it allows to
better understand what is accepted and what is unaccepted by showing the unaccepted
behaviours clearly, but by promoting social unity against deviant behaviour; finally, deviant
behaviour can be the means for a society to change overtime by solving societal
imbalances.

Concluding, groups can have a variety of results in the individual’s sense of identity and its
relation to the rest of society, they form the basis for higher societal levels which can be
measured for further understanding, using demography as a tool. On the other hand,
deviance serves and damages a society at the same time, and is best seen when overall
difficulties arise within a society. If seen as a work of fine art, Society is the full object,
groups form a piece of the composition and demography is one of the possible lenses
through the which to analyse the piece.

Bibliography
 Introduction to Sociology, Wikibooks. Last modified: 29/01/2011. Last revised:
17/04/2011
Available online: [Link]