The Extent to Which Sociologists Agree that Official Criminal Statistics Do Not Give an Accurate Picture of the Extent in Terms of Crime
The official crime statistics on there own are ok to some extent, they
give some accuracy on the crime statistics but they don’t show the
whole picture, there is still a lot of crime which is not reported
(this is known as the hidden figure). Moreover self report studies
give better pictures to the public about criminal statistics. Self
reported studies are confidential surveys that ask people to tick off
boxes from a list. From this a clear picture is created and therefore
the statistics can tell the truth.
Although official crime statistics may appear to show the whole
picture about crimes committed, they need to be treated with concern.
Crime recorded by the police represents only a biased picture of the
total amount of crime committed. Many problems begin when considering
whether the official criminal statistics tell us the truth or not. I
will explore these issues within my essay.
...
In contemporary society, there are various methodologies for collecting data (Linden 2012). That being said, there are pros and cons to each that are based on reliability and validity; where reliability is consistency of the statistics, and validity is a measure of how accurate the results are in accordance with the research topic. This ties in with how this paper will explore the Uniform Crime Report system (UCR); a measure of crime that is used the most. UCR statistics reflect the crimes that are reported to the police throughout the country. victimization and self-report surveys, which are statistics that reinforce the findings revealed by the UCR, will also be explored. Lastly, the issue of media coverage of crime news will be examined.
In Canada, crime is measured using a combination of both police and victim-reported information. Statistics Canada presents surveys to criminologists to analyze the data of criminalization and victimization to determine understand criminal behaviour, how the public perceives it, and how to prevent it. Uniform Crime Reporting Survey (UCR) intended to standardize the collection of police-reported crime statistics from across Canada. Figures generated by UCR are less than perfect, due to variations in the grey lines of recording and interpreting crime between different police. (Cartwright, 2015) The General Social Survey (GSS) was implemented later as a broad social survey to poll for crimes not reported to police. This was because Statistics
Hickey, T. J. (2010). Taking Sides: Clashing Views in Crime and Criminology, 9th Edition. New York, NY: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
Within this essay there will be a clear understanding of the contrast and comparison between left and right realism, supported by accurate evidence that will support and differentiate the two wings of realism.
McCarthy, B. (2002). NEW ECONOMICS OF SOCIOLOGICAL CRIMINOLOGY. Annual Review Of Sociology, 28(1), 417-442. doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.28.110601.140752
We hear a lot about the crime rates going up and down from the media and they tend to expand on specific types of criminal behavior that might be of interest to the public. When politicians are running for office we are told that the crime rates are down due to the tough crime policies that they have been implemented. Citizens seek crime rates for assistance in determining if the area they reside in is safe. Some people wish to get a general idea of the crime rates for a specific neighborhood where they are thinking of purchasing a house. But what is never explained is where do the crime statistics come from and were there any factors that could have had an effect on their reliability. Crime statistics, which are created from what is reported to the police, are often unreliable. There are several influential factors that can make crime statistics both increase and decrease at any time. Most police departments, but not all, use Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) to submit their statistics to the state. Attempting to compare two police agency's crime statistics is almost impossible because not all police agencies use the UCR program for classifying crimes. UCR is a national data reporting policy that is maintained by the state and regulated by the FBI. This policy requires police agencies to report their monthly statistics by following a hierarchy scale for classifying the criminal offenses. A hierarchy scale is a list of crimes in a specific order of importance used to pick out the highest crime when there are multiple crimes committed in one incident. An example: a citizen contacts the police and makes a report of a burglary, a rape and a larceny all occurring in one incident. A...
Crime has always been a hot topic in sociology. There are many different reasons for people to commit criminal acts. There is no way to pinpoint the source of crime. I am going to show the relationship between race and crime. More specifically, I will be discussing the higher chances of minorities being involved in the criminal justice system than the majority population, discrimination, racial profiling and the environment criminals live in.
Robert K. Merton is a widely respected sociologist who has offered much insight in the field of criminology. In efforts to understand why the U.S has disproportionate levels of crime in comparison to similar countries Merton retouched Emile Durkheim’s form of Anomie theory (Lecture, 2016). Merton’s theory is grounded in the belief that the norms of society and their culturally defined goals (for example: The American Dream) place great pressure (or Strain) on individuals to either conform with the socially accepted behavior to attain those goals, or in its place become a player in a nonstandard subculture in attempts to achieve the same underlying goals of society (Cullen, Ch.13). With this, Merton’s Anomie theory was a macro-level approach
In order to find out what caused crime rates to rise; one must first determine whether or not crime actually rose during the time period. Manuel Eisner in his Long-Term Historical Trends in Violent Crime claims that by using homicides as an indicator one can opt that crime actually showed a downward trend during the second industrial revolution (Eisner 85). But Eisner fault lies in the fact that his work only looks at violent crime. David Philips claims this may appear to be because of lack of “full-time paid uniformed police forces” thus the inaccurate, “uncoordinated” system, “contained apparent contradictions” (O'Brien and Quinault 156). Philips goes on to plot an upward trend in crime using committals and not just violent crime like Eisner; Philips plot shows a “very clear and rapid increase” in crime, one that was larger that could be accounted for by population increase alone (O'Brien and Quinault 158). Phi...
...us the risks. By showing how a person’s actions change through a change in the risk of getting caught, the punishment, or the earnings a criminal might earn from his activity, economists help show that criminals to try to maximize their utility whenever they are considering an illegal activity. The economic framework for crime has been expanded to apply to many different areas of economics relating to crime such as: gun control, gangs, illegal drug use and policy in order to get an established view of the economic facts in order to show correlations between individuals and the decisions they choose. Economics can and has been used to create models that explain areas of crime that psychologists, sociologists, and other studies are unable to address as economists have effectively with their models and offers an empirical and statistical approach that provides models
Over the years, research has shown an increase in crime is largely over-represented in media coverage, compared to actual crime rates in society. Reports
Criminology is the study of crime and criminals; a branch of sociology. More accurately, it is the study of crime as a social trend, and its overall origins, its many manifestations and its impact upon society as a whole. That makes it more a form of sociology than a law enforcement tool. But the trends it studies have a huge impact on the way the police do their jobs, the way society treats its criminals, and the way a given community goes about maintaining law and order. The writer will describe and give examples of the three perspectives of viewing crimes. The perspectives that will be highlighted are the consensus view, the conflict view or the interactionist view. Each perspective maintain its own interpretation of what constitutes criminal activities and what causes people to engage in criminal behaviors (Siegel, p.12).
MacDonald, H. (2010, January 4). A crime theory demolished. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870359090504574638024055735590.ht
There are different types of social phenomenon in our society, and one existing phenomenon that capture our attention like no other is crime. What is crime? Crime is an abnormal behavior that violates norms, and especially cultural standards that we as human are suppose to respect and have certain behavior towards. Standards such as : the changing of social, political, psychological, and economic conditions that have an effect on the justification of crime and the structural reaction of the criminal justice system created by Federal and State officials. Rational and deterrence theories are two important theories in this perspective. Research through out history provided us with different theories to help explain why people commit deviance acts.
I now know that criminology prefer to highlight the correlations between crimes’ social climates and criminals’ psychological states of mind. While some argues that criminal behavior is a result of individuals’ association with criminal peers, other claims that crime is a reflection of an individual’s genetic disadvantages. I have come to learn that there are no universally agreed formulas on decoding crimes and criminal behaviors. What we have, however, is a manual full of academic opinions and subjective views that have emerged alongside of the development of criminology. At the same time, the volume of conflicting perspectives that I have stumble upon in studying criminology reminded me again that the success of our current assessment models has yet to be determined. Thus, the study of criminology is an appropriate practice that will further prepare me to conduct meaningful research on legal studies and to provide accurate and in-depth findings in the near