Risk of Being Threatened or Injured by a Gun Among Marginalized Persons

• In Event: 50411 - Rethinking Policing and Drug Policy: Power, Surveillance, and Social Justice

Abstract

We explore whether there is a relationship between one’s primary drug of choice (using alcohol as a reference category) and risk of being injured or threatened by a gun. The bivariate regression results indicated marginally and statistically significant differences in the risk of being injured or threatened with a gun between individuals who noted alcohol as their primary drug of choice and those who noted cocaine, heroin/opioids, and crystal meth as their primary drug of choice. However, all marginally and statistically significant differences between those categories were not found in the model with all control variables added. While this may be explained by the addition of the control variables, it is important to note that there was a noteworthy reduction in sample size with the controlled model. Another interesting finding involved the meaningful differences between those who noted marijuana as their primary drug of choice and all other primary drug of choice categories. In fact, those who used marijuana had the lowest risk of being injured or threatened by a gun in all models.

Authors

• Meghan M. O'Neil, Michigan State University

• Peter Leasure, The Ohio State University