Measurement Issues and Violent Episodic Crime: Some Thoughts and Considerations

• In Event: Measuring Violence and Responses to Violence: Paths to Better Data

Abstract

Despite an extensive body of literature, fear of crime researchers often fail to capture the effects of violent episodic crime (see, for example, Warr, 2000). Data may be collected in yearly aggregates, are collected only once a year, or may not include questions necessary to assess the true impact of a particular event. Researchers have been given a unique opportunity to begin to address this issue, as studies were being conducted during both the 1999 Columbine High School shooting and the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. The timing of these events created naturally-occurring quasi-experimental designs, but the question remains as to whether these studies are able to capture the direct effects of these crimes. This paper considers related measurement issues in disentangling the potential effects of both Columbine and the Boston bombing, and whether the findings of these studies can link changes in fear and avoidance behaviors directly back to the events. Limitations of these studies also are discussed, as well as ways in which these issues may potentially be combatted in future studies.

Authors

• H. Jaymi Elsass, Texas State University

• Jaclyn Schildkraut, State University of New York at Oswego

• Mark C. Stafford, Texas State University