Chapter 3

Question 1

What are the five key purposes for data?

Answer 1

1. Description: describing criminal phenomena
2. Explanation: explaining crime patterns an trends
3. Evaluation: determining how the CJS is working
4. Risk Assessment: calculating relative risk of being victimized
5. Prediction: preventing crime

Question 2

What three elements are crim stats primarily collected from?

Answer 2

police, judicial, correctional

Question 3

What is the most frequent source of official crime data?

Answer 3

Police reports

Question 4

Dark figure of crime

Answer 4

crime that goes undetected, unreported, or unrecorded, and that is thus not included in official sources

Question 5

What are the two main sources of police stats?

Answer 5

1. uniform crime reporting (UCR)
2. canadian centre for justice stats (CCJS)

Question 6

What are the three categories police crime stats are divided in?

Answer 6

1. Summary offences: carry a maximum penalty of six months in jail and/or a fine not exceeding $5000
2. Indictable offences: carry a max penalty of life imprisonment and no max fine
3. Hybrid offences: consist of crimes such as impaired driving and theft under $5000, which the Crown may choose to prosecute as either summary or indictable

Question 7

Judicial Statistics

Answer 7

-historically, court records were the first type of official crime stats to be collected
-beginning in the early nineteenth century, info was gathered on the number of charges and convictions that appeared before the courts, as well as the offender’s sex, income, education, and occupation
-in recent years, CCJS reports have tended to focus on themes such as hate crime, homicide, young offenders, family violence, and home invasion, rather than provide general summaries of crime across Canada

Question 8

Correctional Statistics

Answer 8

data on people being held in federal and provincial corrections facilities, including age, sex, offence, and prior conviction

Question 9

What do Official Data Measure?

Answer 9

-from a social constructionist pov, official stats are collected primarily to meet the collectors’ own needs and thus tend to reflect the collectors’ attitudes regarding what is important
-while crime data offer interesting descriptive info, they do not explain why changes occur

Question 10

What factors affect fluctuations of official crime counts

Answer 10

media coverage, the dark figure of crime, changes in recording procedures

Question 11

Media Coverage

Answer 11

media coverage of crime can influence crime counts. Focusing on certain crimes or crises draws public attention and affects the reporting rates

Question 12

The Dark Figure of Crime

Answer 12

the portion of crime that goes undetected, unreported, or unrecorded may fluctuate over time and even within settings because of changes in variables such as: police enforcement practices, victims’ willingness to to report crime, public attitudes toward the CJS

Question 13

Changes in Recording Procedures

Answer 13

Reasons for under or over reporting are:
-changes in the number of police force
-changes in police/court admin
-changes in legal definition of crime
-changes in population base
-changes in public reporting patterns

Question 14

What was the purpose of the CCJS?

Answer 14

set out to reorganize national data collection methods to meet both federal and provincial needs

Question 15

What are all the limitation of the CCJS?

Answer 15

-no national info on court decisions
-inconsistencies in the way provinces report, as well as count, their crime incidents
-data on crime incidents, arrests, charges, convictions, and dispositions lack depth
-reports provide little insight into crime and criminal behaviour
-no reports on white collar crime, organized crime, victimless crime, etc.

Question 16

Unofficial Crime Data

Answer 16

crime data not collected by official criminal justice agencies, usually to elucidate existing official data and verify the validity of official sources: victimization data, self-report data, observational methods

Question 17

Are victimization surveys used to tap into the dark figure of crime?

Answer 17

Yes

Question 18

What are the limitations of victimization surveys?

Answer 18

-respondents forget about crimes
-respondents forget when crime occurred
-may not feel comfy saying everything
-they might not understand the questions
-different social groups reply differently to questions
-surveys are time consuming and expensive
-You need a high sample to survey which is also expensive

Question 19

How do self report studies work?

Answer 19

-use surveys where individuals are asked to voluntarily disclose whether they have ever committed an offence
-such unofficial crime data can shed light on undetected and underreported types of crime, like sexual assualt

Question 20

What are the limitations of self report data?

Answer 20

-respondents may mistrust the interviewers
-they may not answer truthfully because of embarrassment
-those who feel a deep sense of guilt may not disclose their behaviour
-respondents may exaggerate the truth, especially if they’re young
-they may simply have forgotten

Question 21

Qualitative Research

Answer 21

-research designed to study characteristics that cannot be measured or counted
-pioneered by Weber, who emphasized the importance of understanding how individuals interpret their own actions and the actions/reactions of others
-Weber coined the term “verstehen” - the effort to understand both the intent and the context of human action

Question 22

Field Observation

Answer 22

the objective is to collect data about a phenomenon in the environment in which it occurs

Question 23

Participant Observation

Answer 23

involves a researcher taking part in the activity or social group under study

Question 24

Observation enables data collection on what three levels?

Answer 24

-the activity itself, the activities surrounding them, and their meaning
-the dynamics of the participants and their interrelationships
-the setting in general

Question 25

What are the limitations of observational data?

Answer 25

-the data is subjective
-sample sizes tend to be considerably smaller and as a result, there is no allowance for generalizations beyond the study group
-some observational techniques are used in ways that have raised serious ethical questions
-it tends to be much more labour-intensive than administering victimization or self-report surveys

Question 26

Triangulation

Answer 26

the use of multiple data sources or research methods to investigate a topic, with the goal of producing more reliable findings

Question 27

How data are used: correlation

Answer 27

a statistical relationship between two or more variables. it does not imply causation

Question 28

How data are used: positive correlation

Answer 28

a direct correlation in which an increase in one variable is associated with an increase in the other variable

Question 29

How data are used: negative correlation

Answer 29

a direct correlation in which an increase in one variable is associated with a decrease in the other variable

Question 30

How data are used: causality

Answer 30

the idea that one event is the result of one or more other events

Question 31

How data are used: hypothesis

Answer 31

an idea or assertion about a phenomenon, a situation, or a relationship variables that a researcher sets out to prove or disprove

Question 32

General Aims of Research: Discovery (1)

Answer 32

-to the uninitiated, research findings sometimes seem to stat the obvious
-in addition to verifying the “obvious”, researchers often seek to understand exceptions to the apparent rule

Question 33

General Aims of Research: Demonstration (2)

Answer 33

-t wouldn’t be enough to simply state your claim: you would need to put it to the test

Question 34

General Aims of Research: Refutation (3)

Answer 34

while science provides the objective tools to test ideas and gradually move closer to the truth, it can also be used to refute existing beliefs

Question 35

General Aims of Research: Replication (4)

Answer 35

-the more frequently you can confirm an observation, the greater will be its predictability and consistency
-academic journals are full of studies that replicate previous studies using different participants, different settings, and/or additional measures