Temporal changes in the reporting of intimate partner violence to police, 1973-2013

• In Event: Using the UCR and NCVS to Enhance Understanding of Crime Trends and Offender Behavior

Abstract

Prior research has documented the nature of temporal variation in the reporting of crime to police, but fewer studies have examined the factors that may help to explain these trends. This presentation examines temporal change in the percentage of intimate partner violence incidents that are reported to police as a function of the attributes of the victim and the crime incident. Profound shifts in the public’s understanding of intimate partner violence have occurred over the last 40 years, suggesting that variation in the reporting for this crime should be observed over time. In addition to being the sole source of long-term trends in victim reporting behavior, the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is the only data source capable of examining temporal changes in the reasons why a crime victim chooses to report or not report a crime to the police. The analyses use newly available data files that combine data from NCVS and its predecessor, the National Crime Survey (NCS) spanning the years of 1973-2013. Additionally, these data use a new counting rule for series victimizations recently implemented by the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Authors

• Shannan Catalano, Bureau of Justice Statistics, USDOJ

• Kimberly Martin, Bureau of Justice Statistics, USDOJ