Cohen's Moral Panic

Moral Panic is a condition, episode, person or groups of people who emerge as a threat to the societal values and interests.

Feautires of Moral Panic:

• Concern - Behaviour of a particular group is represented as being a threat
• Volatility - Short lives drama, were the panic emerges dramatically then fizzes out
• Hostility - "folk devils" constructed to create clear diversion between "them" & "us"
• Consensus - widespread acceptance of the threat
• Disproportionality - wild exaggeration of the evidence.

Cohen in his book Folk Devils and Moral Panics lead the way in determining what a Moral Panic was and got the public interested in what the idea is.
An example of Moral Panic is the drug and alcohol filled lifestyle of Amy Winehouse, who the media decided was influincing young people into living their lives this way.