Crime and Deviance - how are they measures? Flashcards
Name all methods of measuring crime and devience
Official Statistics
Victim Studies
Self Report Studies
Define and Evaluate Official Statistics
Generated by Authorites (police, courts, conviction centres etc)
Evaluation
+ Large amounts of data
+ Records patterns and trends overtime
- Ignores crimes which are not reported/recorded
- Changes in recording may affect validity of data
Define and Evaluate Victim Studies
Quiz that asks if youve been a victim of a crime
+ Useful because there is a large sample-representative
☺️Records a number of offences that official statistics don’t
☺️Compliments official statistics (& is now included in ONS data)
☹️Not useful because - doesn’t include businesses, homeless people, younger children etc.
☹️Relies on memory/honesty etc
Define and explain self report studies
asks people what crime they have committed
☺️Useful because they give further insight into offending - e.g. Box argues they show that working classes are overrepresented in official stats and therefore unfairly targeted by police. Whilst middle classes do report committing fewer crimes the difference is not as stark as statistics suggest
☹️Not useful because people might lie about their involvement in crime
Better for low level crimes such as delinquent behaviour rather than serious crimes
Functionlaist perspective on Statistics
A positivist perspective who believe that statistics are reliable and valid.
Marxist perespective on Statistics
Official Statistics are a reflection of ruling class ideology.
Feminism perspective on statistics
Underplay the role of women as victims
Interactionism perspective on statistics
Distortion of reality and tells us more about who compiled them then the crime rate.
Left Realists
Have some use and shouldn’t be rejected out of hand
