Objectives

1
Objectives
Today students will

• Discuss main issues in the study of deviance
• Compare and contrast functionalist and conflict
  theory approaches to deviance

2
Deviance in Sports
3
Main Issues in the Study of Deviance as a Social
Problem

• What is deviance?
• Are deviant behaviours a serious problem on or
  off the field?
• Is there a connection between certain male sports
  and deviance off the field?
• Why do some athletes choose to use performance
  enhancing substances? Can this be controlled?

4
Problems When Studying Deviance

• What is deviant outside sports may be acceptable
  inside sports
• Deviance frequently involves accepting norms
  unquestioningly
• Implementation of medical practices and
  application of sport sciences normalizes many
  medical and other interventions previously
  reserved for the sick

5
Using Functionalist Theory to Define Deviance

• Conformity is equated with morality
• Deviance involves a rejection of accepted goals
  or the means of achieving goals in society
• Deviance is caused by faulty socialization or
  inconsistencies in the social system
• Deviance is controlled by getting tough and
  enforcing more rules more strictly

6
Using Conflict Theory to Define Deviance

• Deviance involves behaviours that interfere with
  the interests of those with economic power
• The behaviour of those who lack power is more
  likely to be labelled as deviant
• Those who deviate often are victims of
  exploitation in a system characterized by
  inequalities
• The problem of deviance will be minimal when
  power is equally distributed in society

7
Using Interactionist Critical Theories to
Define Deviance

• Most deviance in sports not due to moral
  bankruptcy of athletes or process of economic
  exploitation
• Much deviance in sports involves over conformity
  to established sport norms
• Sport deviance must be understood in terms of the
  normative context of sport cultures and the
  emphasis on the sport ethic

8
Discussion Question

• You have a 20-year old friend who is an excellent
  distance runner on her college track team. She
  has decided that if she wants to reach her
  potential next season she should lose a few
  pounds as she trains. You know she is using
  prescription weight loss drugs that she obtained
  illegally. Which of the three theoretical
  approaches explained in the chapter
  (functionalist, conflict, or interactionist
  critical) would you use to explain her drug use?
  Why would you choose this approach over the other
  two?

9
Two Types of Deviance in Sport
10
Discussion Question

• What is it about sports that promotes over
  conformity (or positive deviance)?

11
Positive Deviance
The sports ethic is identified as a major
pressure on athletes to over conform

• Reasons for positive deviance include
• pursuit of the thrills of sport, desire to show
  unyielding commitment, compensation for low
  esteem, perception that sport is a singular means
  to get ahead in life
• Consequently, athletes most likely to over
  conform are those who
• have low self-esteem
• are so eager to be accepted that they will do
  whatever they think others want them to do
• see sport as their only way to succeed and become
  important in the world

12
Controlling Deviant Over-Conformity in Sports

• Learn to identify the forms and dynamics of over
  conformity among athletes
• Raise critical questions about the meaning,
  organization, and purpose of sports
• Create norms in sports that discourage over
  conformity to the sport ethic
• Help athletes to learn to strike a balance
  between accepting and questioning rules and norms
  in their sports

13
Negative Deviance On-the-field

• Some research challenges popular belief
  suggesting this type of deviance is less common
  now than before the days of television coverage
  and big salaries
• the existence of more rules in sport today may
  play a role in the perception that deviance on
  the field has increased
• in some instances athletes have come to expect a
  degree of onthe-field rule violation

14
Negative Deviance Off-the-fieldWhat does the
research show?

• delinquency rates for athletes are lower than
  those of non-athletes of similar backgrounds
• rates of binge drinking are significantly higher
  among student athletes than among non-athletes
• findings are inconclusive concerning links
  between sports and academic cheating and those
  between sports and sexual assault

15
For Next Class

• Complete the discussion questions posted on Acme
• Finish reading Coakley and Donnelly, Chapter 7 if
  you have not already done so.

16
Substance Abuse Among Athletes

• Athletes have experimented with and used various
  substances to increase performance for a very
  long time but not at a significant rate
• In the last 50 years there has been an increase
  in the use of performance-enhancing drugs along
  with the development of synthetic hormones and
  introduction of strength training and conditioning

17
Discussion Question
Discuss the following in small groups

• It is discovered that the successful athletes in
  distance running and swimming from an Asian
  country use a special herb in their diet. This
  herb only grows in the special high-altitude
  environment in which the Asian runners train.
• Should the herb be put on the banned-substance
  list?
• What are all the issues that need to be
  considered when answering this question?

18
Managing Substance Abuse

• Many factors make both defining what constitutes
  a drug and developing a strong case against drug
  use in sports difficult
• In the case of the latter, these factors include
• difficulties associated with policing
• messages that promote the use of drugs outside of
  sports

19
Objectives
Today students will

• Complete a quiz on Chapter 6
• Complete our discussion of deviance
• Begin a discussion of violence in sport

20
Discussion Question
Discuss the following with the others at your
table

• You have a mid-term exam in your sociology of
  sport course. You must have a good grade to
  maintain the GPA that you think you should
  maintain as a serious student. You take an
  over-the-counter caffeine supplement so you can
  study all night. You get an A but your
  instructor discovers that your test score was
  drug aided.
• Should your A be turned to an F? Should you be
  put on academic probation? How is your situation
  different from the cross-country skier who after
  being discovered to have used EPO before a race
  she won at a the 2002 Winter Olympic Games was
  disqualified and lost her medal?

21
Discussion Question

• Athletes are not the only people in sports who
  violate norms.
• Using information from your own experience or
  from what has occurred recently in sports in your
  country, community, or on your campus, identify
  examples of deviance among people in sports other
  than athletes. Are these forms of deviance new,
  or have they existed also in the past?

22
Other Perpetrators of Deviance in Sports

• Coaches
• Program administrators
• Team owners
• Sports administrators
• Fans
• Team managers and staff
• Media promoters and programmers
• Agents
• Spectators

23
A1 Student Questions

• Questions addressed by our textbook
• Does being actively involved in individual or
  team sports help discourage adolescents from
  engaging in deviant behaviour?
• What makes professional athletes want to continue
  doping when they know the great risks they are
  taking?
• Why do athletes take supplements when competing?
• How do people's personalities change when they
  are in a team environment?
• Questions for further research
• How does an athlete's reputation be affected if
  proven guilty of sport enhancing drugs?
• Are there many athletes in Canada who have taken
  illegal drugs? (Compared to the rest of the world)

24
B1 Student Questions

• Questions addressed by our textbook
• Why are sport enhancing substances allowed in
  some sports but not others?
• Why people feel that steroids are such a
  necessity to perform at one's highest potential.
• How do sport enhancement drugs influence
  children?
• Will drug testing take away some of the freedom
  which our athletes should have as a person?
• Why do some athletes develop eating disorders
  such as bulimia or anorexia?
• Questions for further research
• Why does everyone hate performance enhancing
  drugs?
• How drug use in sport affect athletes who do not
  use drugs.
• Are performance enhancing drugs predominantly
  used by males?
• With steroid use in sports is it impossible to
  become a new legend in sports such as baseball?

25
Discussion Question

• A family friend tells you that deviance is simply
  out of control in sports today. He also says that
  if he was in charge of sports, he would control
  deviance among athletes by strictly enforcing
  rules based on the ideals of sport, and that he
  would punish anyone caught breaking the rules.
• What conceptual approach to deviance is your
  friend using, and how would you explain to him
  that his approach has serious weaknesses?

26
Discussion Question
Discuss the following with the others at your
table

• One of your friends who is always talking about
  the need for a strict law and order approach to
  crime tells you that athletes who take
  testosterone, anabolic steroids, or growth
  hormones are no different from heroine addicts
  who shoot up in the streets. How would you use
  critical and Interactionist theories to explain
  that there are differences in the dynamics of
  these two types of drug use, and that these
  differences must be recognized if drug use in
  sports is to be controlled?

27
Discussion Question

• In groups of three or four discuss the following
• do you think it is possible to have elite sports
  in which the use of performance enhancing
  substances does not occur? If you say yes, then
  explain how you would maintain a substance free
  environment. If your answer is no, then explain
  why it is not possible.