Crim Research Module PDF

NORSU ETEEAP MODULE
CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH
AND STATISTICS
Dan Jerome S. Barrera, MSCJ

College of Criminal Justice Education
Negros Oriental State University
2016
NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE
CONTENTS
PART 1: INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH METHODS
Lesson 1: Introduction to Research
Lesson 2: Approaches in Research
PART 2: THE RESEARCH PROCESS
Lesson
Lesson
Lesson
Lesson
Lesson
Lesson
3:
4:
5.
6:
7:
8:
Introduction to Research Design

Problem Formulation
Measurement
Data Collection
Data Analysis
Crime analysis and crime mapping
2
2
12
19
19
41
56
78
96
133
PART 1
INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH METHODS
LESSON 1
INTRODUCTION TO THE RESEARCH PROCESS
When we try to explain or control crime, oftentimes we rely on
several sources of knowledge that are readily available but at worst readily
flawed. For instance, we rely on common sense, tradition, authority, or
anecdotal accounts. In this part, you will learn another source of
knowledge that attempts to lessen the biases associated with flawed
sources of knowledge.
After reading this lesson, you shall be able to:

define research;
discuss the importance of research; and
outline the major steps in conducting research.
Key terms
Research
Theory
Practical problem
Research problem
Data
Literature review
Why do research?
Before we tackle what is research, let us first learn the importance
of research and what motivate researchers to do it. We will shortly return
to a popular adage that goes, Knowledge is power. Knowledge of problems
and, of course, knowledge of their solutions are powerful tools of advancing
our society. Thus, research primarily aims to advance and create new
knowledge. This is very true in the field of criminology and criminal justice.
We cannot control what we do not know. Thus, knowing crime and
the ways to control them, including the ones who control them, can really
prove useful for our efforts against crime. For example, if a chief of police
wishes to lessen crime in his jurisdiction, he should not do it in a
haphazard way. He/she first needs to explore the patterns of crime in
terms of its hot spots and hot times. With knowledge on the patterns of
crime, he/she might proceed to increase police efforts in these times and
places. And to guide his/her future actions, he/she can evaluate the
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effectiveness of the interventions he/she has devised. All of these activities

might use a systematic process of knowing called research.
Dantzker and Hunter (2006) enumerate common reasons for
conducting research in criminology and criminal justice curiosity, social
problems, and theory testing.
Curiosity. Researchers are curious people who find joy in knowing
something about an event or object. Thus, for instance upon hearing from
a news report about a certain crime, say a bomb threat, a researcher might
explore the characteristics of these little known events to satisfy his
curiosity on who communicates bomb threat, when, where, and how.
Social problems. Aside from curiosity, the researcher might be
motivated in solving social problems. In criminology and criminal justice,
the social problem we are very much interested is crime. Thus, aside from
being curious with our example about bomb threats, the researcher might
aim his findings into building knowledge that could help curb these events.
He could discuss his findings within the prevention and control literature
of bomb threats.
Theory testing. Sometimes, a researcher is motivated in testing
theories created to explain crime or any phenomenon in criminology and
criminal justice. A theory is a set of propositions that try to explain
something. For example, Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990) proposed their
general theory of crime, self-control theory. They argued that a person with
low self-control is impulsive and self-seeking and thus will likely commit
crime is given an opportunity. Upon knowing that self-control theory had
yet to be tested in explaining police deviance, Donner and Jennings (2014)
tested the theory using a survey on 1,935 police officers in Philadelphia,
USA. They aimed to determine whether low-self-control accounts for
occupational deviance committed by the said police officers. Indeed, those
police officers with low self-control committed more police misconduct
than their counterparts.
However, a researcher might be motivated by all of these reasons in
conducting research. Thus, if you conduct research on a phenomenon, it
is an advantage if you explore an event that you are interested; the results
can help solve a problem, and the findings can support or modify a certain
theory.
Who are researchers?
Researchers are men of science; thus, researchers are scientists. If
you are to think, however, of a scientist, you might visualize a person with
eyeglasses in a laboratory doing experiments involving chemicals and lots
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of laboratory instruments. The name scientist is not strictly only for these
people. Actually, a person is a man of science if he/she uses scientific
method in solving a problem; and a researcher uses the steps of scientific
method in conducting a research. It follows then that anyone can become
a researcher as long as he is well-versed in scientific method and uses it
to solve problems. An undergraduate criminology student, criminology
professor, police officer, correctional officer, lawyer, or even a civilian can
become men of science if they use the steps in research to solve a crime
problem.
What is research?
Probably, your first question in this course might be: What is
research? Before answering this question, let me first illustrate what is not
research.
Research is NOT . . .
when you are told by your instructor to do research in the library

about types of crime, for example;
when you tell your parents that you need money because you are
going to an internet caf to do research about types of crime; or
when you ask permission from your parents to go to your

classmates house and go home late because you are researching
types of crime.
The term research that you usually use in these situations

connotes another term. Instead of using research, the best word you can
use is literature review. A literature review is an act of browsing the
literature (e.g. books, research journals, and articles in the internet) for a
specific topic, say types of crimes, and collating what these sources say
about types of crimes through writing an essay. It should be noted,
however, that reviewing the literature about a topic is a requisite of
research. In order to not reinvent the wheel, the researcher must review
the literature, especially previous research. By reviewing previous
research, one will know the gaps of the literature, and, therefore, he/she
can situate his research within the big puzzle of the literature about his
chosen topic.
In this course, we shall use the following short definition:

Research is a conscientious process of solving a problem.
Given this very short (and perhaps incomplete) definition, it is
important for us to discuss two major elements of this definition process
and solving problems problem.
Research solves problems . . .
Researchers use scientific methods in solving problems. But what
do we mean by the word problem? A problem is anything that a person
finds unsatisfactory or unsettling, a difficulty of some sort, a state of affairs
that needs to be changed, anything that is not working as well as it might
(Fraenkel & Wallen, 2006: 26). There are two types of problem that
researchers attempt to study and solve practical and research problem
(Booth, Colomb & Williams, 2003).
Practical problems. This is probably your most known problem.
Most of the time we encounter practical problems in the family (e.g. conflict
and finances), in work (e.g. backlog of job assignments), or in any area of
your life. In criminology, we see crime as our primary problem. Booth et
al. (2003:59) thus say: A practical problem is caused by some condition in
the world, from e-mail spam to terrorism, that makes us unhappy because
its costs us time, money, respect, security, pain, even our lives. Clearly
crime is a practical problem. It makes us unhappy because it endangers
our lives and it costs us lots of resources. However, no one study could
solve a practical problem. Instead, researchers solve practical problems by
first solving research problems.
Research problems. These problems are quite conceptual and
sometimes hard to grasp because all of us are used to encountering
practical problems, and few ever heard of research problems. According to
Booth et al. (2003:59), A research problem is motivated not by palpable
unhappiness, but by incomplete knowledge or flawed understanding. In
other words, research problem pertains to what we do not know about a
practical problem. These things that we do not know answers questions of
what, when, where, how and why.
Let us take for example crime as a practical problem. One of the
commonly agreed solution to this problem is random mobile patrol.
However, some police officers in Kansas City doubted on the effectiveness
of this strategy in reducing crime and improving perceptions of community
members towards the police and fear of crime (Kelling et al., 1974). They
did not know (a research problem) whether this strategy could in fact lead
5
to lower crimes and improved community perceptions. They had no

empirical (based on facts generated by observations) evidence for its
effectiveness. Thus, Kelling et al. (1974) evaluated the effectiveness of
random routine patrol of police officers across the city of Kansas, USA.
They wanted to determine whether intensive random patrol decreases
more crime and achieves more of some other measures of police
effectiveness than reactive patrol and normal levels of patrol. They
compared three groups of areas: control, reactive, and proactive. In control
areas, they maintained normal levels of patrol; in reactive areas, they did
not employ any form of patrol; and in proactive areas, they increased police
visibility two to three times than normal levels. To their surprise, after one
year, they found no significant differences in crime levels and in other
criteria among the three areas, thereby casting doubt on the effectiveness
of random patrol in reducing crime. Perhaps, the problem of random patrol
is that it is not systematic and not directed to high crime areas. Recent
experiments in criminology show that hot spots policing which are directed
to high crime areas do in fact reduce crime (see Braga, Papachristos &
Hureau, 2012).
Another example of this was the problem Donner and Jennings
(2014) wanted to solve. Earlier, we discussed about self-control theorys
argument that persons with low self-control tend to commit more crime
than persons with high self-control. In their theory, Gottfredson and
Hirschi (1990) argue that their theory is capable of explaining all forms of
crime and deviance, at all places and times. When Donner and Jennings
(2014) reviewed the researches using self-control theory, they discovered
that no one has used the theory to explain police misconduct. Thus, they
did not know whether self-control levels could explain police misconduct.
They wanted to fill this gap in the literature and conducted a research in
this line of inquiry.
In your research, you might be interested in conducting research on
certain crimes in the Philippines of which little is still known and
published in research journals. Fortunately, almost all research about
crime and justice in the Philippines is new as research in Philippine
criminology is scarce.
Research is a conscientious process . . .
Research is a process comprising steps deliberately planned and
executed by the researcher. As a process, however, we do not mean that
there are strict steps to be followed to do research. Nevertheless, there are
generic steps that most researchers follow; these steps are what constitute
the scientific method.
These are the major steps in scientific method that researchers use
to solve research problems discussed above (Dantzker and Hunter, 2006;
Maxfield & Babbie, 2005):
1. Identifying the problem
Here the researcher identifies his/her problem and formulates his
arguments and speculations to answer a certain problem. For
example, if the topic is about bomb threats, after reading the
literature and finding that previous research focused primarily on
characteristics of offenders, he may reasoned out that in order to
advance knowledge about bomb threats there is a need to explore
the spatial and temporal dimensions of these events. The spatial and
temporal patterns of bomb threats are things which researchers do
not know this is the research problem. He will argue then that
bomb threats are concentrated in space and time; and thus, nonrandom like other crimes.
2. Research design
The researcher then plans how to support this argument and to
collect the data. She/he can choose among several research
methods (i.e. survey, experiment, or secondary data analysis). Next,
he/she will decide who to study, when, what, and where. In this
case, since doing a national survey is not feasible considering
logistical and financial requirements, and experiment appears
inappropriate, the researcher can use a secondary data analysis of
reports about bomb threats. He then decides the time frame, say
2005-2014, and the place of study, say the whole Philippines not
his/her province to collect more data since these events are rare.
3. Data collection
The researcher now collects data he/she can analyze to support his
arguments. If reports of bomb threats are routinely collected by a
law enforcement agency, he can ask for such data from such agency.
If not, he/she can look for an alternative data source, like the news
reports because bomb threats are high intensity events like terrorist
acts which gain much attention from journalists and, thus, reported
in the media. He can locate online reports, instead of newspaper
reports, about bomb threats to expedite the data collection. After
collecting the news reports, it is time for the researcher to code the
news reports according to the desired data; for example: time, date,
location, type of target, presence of explosives, and words used by
the perpetrator.
4. Data analysis
When the data are ready for analysis, the researcher then uses
statistical software to summarize the data, especially to determine
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whether bomb threats are non-random and tend to concentrate in

space and time. If such concentration of bomb threats occurred, he
can then create graphs, tables, and other statistical outputs of
his/her analysis.
5. Reporting of results
Finally the researcher then writes a research article (by the way this
is just an essay) arguing that bomb threats are non-random in space
and time. To support his argument, he/she will embed the graphs,
tables, and other statistics in the research article, and try to
interpret and build conclusions about the results. Lastly, he may
relate the findings to the literature of bomb threats and suggest
some recommendations to authorities directly involved in controlling
such events.
We shall postpone this time our full discussion of these steps. We
will delve on them in detail in the next lessons. The idea is that research
employs the systematic process of scientific method.
What research is like?
As you contemplate on the five major steps above, you might think
of some processes and criminal justice practitioners familiar to you. A
researcher is much like a criminal investigator and a prosecutor.
A researcher doing research is like . . .
a police investigator building a case against an individual

In the example above, the researcher argues and builds his own
case that bomb threats are non-random events in space and time
and uses statistics, tables, graphs and other figures to support
such argument. Similarly, a police investigator makes arguments
and provide evidence to support the arguments while conducting
investigations. First, he argues that there is corpus delicti or that
a crime exists. He can collect evidence say a weapon, dead body,
nature of the wounds to support his argument that a crime (e.g.
murder) exists. Then, he argues that out of the pool of suspects
one, Juan dela Cruz, might be the one who actually committed
the crime because of some evidence like fingerprints, blood,
footprints, the weapon, and other evidence that connects Juan to
the crime scene and possibly to the crime itself. Then, the
investigator writes an investigation report.
a prosecutor who argues in court that there is probable cause

to believe that the accused might have committed the crime
charged
The researcher who is doing research is also much similar to a
prosecutor who argues that there is probable cause to believe
that an accused might have in fact committed the crime. He uses
the evidence collected by the investigator and the results of his
analysis of the case after both the offended party and the
respondent are given opportunity to be heard of their sides and
to present their evidence, to come up with a decision whether to
file the case before the court or dismiss the same. If he/she finds
probable cause, he/she then writes his resolution of the case and
subsequently the information (written accusation) containing his
argument and the evidence supporting the same. He then files
this information with the court. The research article of a
researcher is similar to this document called information
accomplished by the prosecutor.
Summary
Research is an act of creating and advancing knowledge. In doing
this, researchers motivated by curiosity, social problems, and theory
testing use scientific method in solving practical and conceptual
problems. The researcher argues about something, say a crime, and
attempts to collect data to support such argument. This undertaking is
much similar to a police investigator or a prosecutor who collects, collates,
and analyze evidence to support his argument that a certain individual
might have committed the crime.
LESSON 1 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Discuss the importance of research and who researchers are.
________________________________________________________________________
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2. What is a research problem and how different is it from practical
problems?
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________________________________________________________________________
3. List at least 5 research problems in criminology and criminal justice
of which you are interested to solve. Give also the practical problems
that may be solves in part if such research problems are solved.
________________________________________________________________________
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________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
4. Describe and discuss the research process.
________________________________________________________________________
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References
Braga, A., Papachristos, A. & Hureau, D. (2012). The effects of hot spots
policing on crime: An update systematic review and meta-analysis. Justice
Quarterly, 1-31.
Booth, W., Colomb, G. & Williams, J. (2003). The craft of research. Chicago:
The University of Chicago.
Dantzker, M.L. & Hunter, R. (2006). Research methods for criminology
and criminal justice. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, Inc.
Donner, C. & Jennings, W. G. (2014). Low self-control and police
deviance: Applying Gottfredson and Hirschis general theory to officer
misconduct. Police Quarterly, 17(3): 203-225.
Fraenkel, J. & Wallen, N. (2006). How to design and evaluate research in
education. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
Gottfredson, M.R. & Hirschi, T. (1990). A general theory of crime.
Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Kelling, G.L., Pate, A., Diekman, D. & Brown, C. (1974). The Kansas City
Preventive Patrol Experiment: Summary Version. Washington, D.C.: Police
Foundation
Maxfield, M. & Babbie, E. (2005). Research methods for criminal justice and
criminology. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
11
LESSON 2
RESEARCH APPROACHES
In the previous lesson, you were introduced to the nature of research
and its major steps. However, a trained researcher is aware that some of
those major steps are only applicable to certain research activities. For
instance, the use of statistics to support arguments is inappropriate and
not feasible in some research endeavors. Some researchers use interviews
and the very words of the respondents to support their arguments, or these
researchers may only gather data from only one respondent in some cases.
In this lesson, you will learn why this is so.
distinguish between the different approaches in research;
give examples of each approach; and
discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each approach.
Key terms
Basic research
Applied research
Inductive reasoning
Deductive reasoning
Idiographic explanations Nomothetic explanations
Quantitative research Qualitative research

Is there only one approach in research?
No. In fact, the strength of research lies in the use of multiple
approaches in studying a problem (Babbie, 2001; Maxfield & Babbie,
2005). For instance, if you are interested in studying drug users you can
choose from an array of approaches. You can do a survey like what the
Dangerous Drugs Board (2008) did, or you can choose known drug users
or just a drug user in a barangay for in-depth phenomenological
interviews. In the survey, you can summarize your data using statistical
tables, graphs and other figures, while in you can present the rich words
coming from your interviews in your in-depth study. Among these
approaches, no one is better than the other. Each of these approaches has
its own appropriate use, and each can inform the other.
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What are the approaches in research?

We can apply some dichotomizations of research approaches in
criminology and criminal justice. Among these research dichotomizations
are: Basic Applied, Idiographic Nomothetic, Inductive Deductive, and
Quantitative Qualitative (see Babbie, 2001; Dantzker & Hunter, 2006;
Maxfield & Babbie, 2005).
Basic and Applied Research
Research can be classified as basic and applied research. Earlier, we
discussed about the study of Donner and Jennings (2014) on the effects
of low self-control on police deviance. Note that this research aims to add
to the literature of self-control by determining whether the propositions of
Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990) can be applied in police misconduct
research. Donner and Jennings research is a basic research. Basic
research are conducted to generate and advance knowledge that have no
immediate practical applications but nevertheless advance a certain field
of study. Knowing that low self-control is associated with police deviance
implies that one way to curb misconduct in police work is to improve selfcontrol of police officers. However, this seems to be difficult and
impractical for many reasons (which are too long to enumerate here).
Usually, basic research are aimed to validate or test theories of crime like
self-control theory (Gottfredson and Hirschi, 1990), general strain theory
(Agnew, 1992), and social learning theory (Akers et al., 1979).
In the preceding lesson, we also discussed about the study of Kelling
et al. (1974) on the effects of intensive random patrol in Kansas, USA.
Kelling and his colleagues were doing an applied research. An applied
research aims to inform authorities on what are promising policies that
could improve practice in the criminal justice field. Applied research
comprises evaluation and policy analysis (see Maxfield & Babbie, 2005 for
an elaboration). Applied research not only test theories of crime but also
informs policy formulation, thereby making it the most useful research in
criminal justice (Dantzker & Hunter, 2006).
Idiographic and Nomothetic Explanations
One of the most important uses of research is to explain something
(in criminology, crime and justice). Why do some persons commit crime?
Why does a husband maltreat his wife? Why do police officers commit
misconduct at work? Why do some places have higher crime levels
compared with other places? Knowing the answers of these questions can,
of course, inform policy makers; and answering these questions using
research can use two types of approach - idiographic and nomothetic.
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Idiographic and nomothetic research differ in terms of the number

of study subjects, the number of explanatory factors used to explain
something, and the generalizability of the findings. Idiographic research
studies one case or instance to have an in-depth investigation of numerous
factors to explain something, say crime. However, since only once case is
studied, the researcher is only capable of explaining such case and cannot
use his findings to explain other cases in other situations. On the other
hand, nomothetic research studies several cases but uses few factors to
explain something; the findings of which, however, are generalizable to a
range of cases.
We will illustrate the difference between idiographic and nomothetic
research by answering the research question: Why do husbands maltreat
their wives? To answer this question we will use as an illustration the
studies of Ysmael (2009) and Babu and Kar (2010). Ysmael (2009) studied
the case of Lumen, a battered married woman in Cebu City. He used case
study method to discover the factors that contribute to the victimization
experiences of Lumen. The focus on one woman provided him with very
rich information about the experiences of Lumen before, during, and after
the abuse. However, one pitfall of his research is that his findings could
not be generalized to other cases of battered women. In other words, what
he discovered could not be used to explain the cases of other abused
married women in Cebu City. On the other hand, Babu and Kar (2010)
used survey method to study 1,718 married women and 1,715 married
men in Eastern India. Although their findings are not that rich compared
with Ysmaels (2009), their findings could be generalized to several cases,
possibly, even up to the whole population of married men and women in
Eastern India.
Inductive and Deductive Reasoning
We will now turn our attention to another dichotomization of
research inductive and deductive reasoning. In this dichotomization, we
shall familiarize the role of theory in criminology and criminal justice
research. Although there is no agreed upon definition of theory, we shall
agree with Champion (1993) who synthesized theorys definition provided
by social scientists Robert Merton and Arnold Rose. Theory refers to an
integrated body of assumptions, propositions, and definitions that are
related in such a way so as to explain and predict relationships between
two or more variables (Champion, 1993:19). (We shall elaborate more on
theory in the lesson about research problem and measurement.)
Inductive reasoning goes from specific details to general
propositions, while deductive reasoning goes the opposite. Let us use the
reasoning used in criminal investigation and criminal prosecution in court
to enlighten us about these research approaches. Criminal investigators
14
often use inductive reasoning and proceed from specific details to general
propositions. For instance, after the investigator has collected evidence
(the weapon used, samples of blood, fingerprints, and other trace
evidence), he learns that the weapon belongs to Juan dela Cruz and the
samples of blood, fingerprints, and other trace evidence match with that
of Juan, the investigator then can speculate that Juan might be the one
who has committed the crime. Note that the investigator begins from
specific details (pieces of evidence) and proceed to a general proposition
(that Juan might have committed the crime).
On the other hand, a criminal prosecutor proceeds in the opposite
way when they prosecute an accused in court. As you have learned from
your criminal procedure class, a prosecutor files an information (a written
allegation) with the court. In this information, he/she alleges that the
accused might have committed the crime. In the trial, the prosecutor rests
on this proposition and try to argue using pieces of evidence that the
accused might be the one who committed the crime. Thus, in trial, he/she
presents evidence just to support his claim. Note that he/she goes from a
general position (that the accused might have committed the crime) and
proceeds to specific details (pieces of evidence) to support the proposition.
Research can also be either inductive or deductive in its approach.
In inductive research, the researcher analyzes data, and out of this
analysis, he/she attempts to build a proposition or a theory. Inductive
research uses some qualitative research methods or quantitative data
mining strategies. In deductive research, the researcher analyzes data to
test a given theory. Researchers often experiment and conduct surveys to
test theories. Looking back to our previous example of the study of Donner
and Jennings (2014), we will find an example of a deductive research. At
the start of their research they had already their proposition from selfcontrol theory that police officers who had low self-control would commit
more police misconduct that those who had high self-control. To test this
theoretical proposition they analyzed survey data on more than one
thousand police officers in Philadelphia. The results support their
proposition.
Quantitative and Qualitative Research
One of the most known dichotomization in research is the
distinction between quantitative and qualitative research. Spotting these
approaches in journal articles is quite easy. Quantitative research uses
numerical data to support or generate propositions, while qualitative
research uses data in words (usually obtained through interviews).
Quantitative research usually employs experiments, surveys, and
secondary analysis from which numerical data are obtained. Qualitative
research, on the other hand, employs case study, phenomenology,
15
ethnography and other qualitative research from which words from

respondents and other participants are obtained. (Please see Fraenkel &
Wallen, 2006 p. 430 for a detailed comparison between quantitative and
qualitative research).
Summary
There is no one approach in doing research in crime and justice, but
neither of the approaches is better. General dichotomizations of research
approaches include: applied basic, idiographic nomothetic, inductive
deductive, and quantitative qualitative. Note, however, that it is the
researchers responsibility on what approach he/she shall take as long as
this approach is the best approach to study or solve a particular problem
practical or conceptual. The next lessons will surely guide you in this
concern.
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LESSON 2 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
Go to Google.com. In the search bar, type criminology journal. After
this, search results will show you Criminology journals website hosted
by its publisher, Wiley. Criminology is an interdisciplinary research journal
on crime and justice topics. It is the top research journal in criminology
around the world. Now search its current issue and previous issues,
browse titles of published articles, read their abstracts, and list the titles
of research articles which are examples of
Basic and applied research (5 examples each)
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__________________________________________________________________
Now go to another journal, Journal of Research in Crime and
Delinquency, published by SAGE. Look for and list examples of
Quantitative and qualitative research (5 examples each)
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
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17
References
Agnew, R. (1992). Foundation for a general strain theory of
crime and delinquency. Criminology, 30, 4788.
Akers, R., Krohn, M., Lanza-Kaduce, L. & Radosevich, M. (1979). Social
learning and deviant behavior: A specific test of a general theory.
American Sociological Review, 44(4): 636-655.
Babbie, E. (2001). The practice of social research. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth
Babu, B.V. & Kar, S.K. (2010). Domestic violence in Eastern India:
Factors associated with victimization and perpetration. Public Health,
124: 136-148.
Champion, D. (1993). Research methods for criminal justice and
criminology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Dangerous Drugs Board. (2008). Study on the Current Nature and Extent
of Drug Abuse in the Philippines. Retrieved on February 12, 2013, from
http://www.ddb.gov.ph/joomla/images/2008%20National%20Househol
d%20Survey.pdf
Foundation
Ysmael, F. (2009). Lumen: A case study on domestic violence. JPAIR
Multidisciplinary Research, 3(1):58-72.
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PART 2
RESEARCH DESIGN
LESSON 3
INTRODUCTION TO RESEARCH DESIGN
It seems that you are familiar now with what is research and the
approaches from which researchers choose. This time, you will learn what
constitute research design and, of course, how to design your own
research. Designing your own research requires you to be careful so that
no time and other resources are wasted. Imagine when a student has
already conducted his study and has already spent much of his time,
energy and money, but when evaluation comes the evaluators just say:
This study was poorly designed; there is a need for a major revision, and
the worst, The researcher must perform his research again with a
different but appropriate design. For a student who has already done his
best, these lines sounds devastating. This is the first lesson in PART 2 that
will help you avoid such situation.
enumerate and discuss the purposes of research;

discuss the units of analysis in research;
discuss the time dimension of research.
Key terms
Research design
Exploratory research
Descriptive research
Explanatory research
Units of analysis
Cross-sectional research
Longitudinal research
What is research design?
Research design is the blueprint of your study (Dantzker & Hunter,
2006). When you design a study you specify exactly who or what is to be
studied, when, how, and for what purpose (Babbie, 2001:90). Designing
research requires the researcher to be very specific in what is the general
purpose of the study whether the researcher wants to explore a little
known phenomenon, describes a phenomenon, or explain why such
phenomenon occur (purpose of the study). The researcher must also decide
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who or what he/she is going to explore, describe, or whose actions he/she

is going to explain (unit of analysis). He/she also decides the time he
observes what or who he observes once only or overtime (time dimension).
Finally, he plans how he is going to collect the data needed in his study
(research method). We will start with deciding the overall purpose of your
study.
What is the purpose of my study?
You can do research for the following common purposes:
exploration, description, explanation, or evaluation (Babbie, 2001;
Bachman & Schutt, 2008; Dantzker & Hunter, 2006; Maxfield & Babbie,
2005). You should note, however, that a study can fulfill two or more of
these purposes. Some studies explores a crime and justice related subject
by describing, explaining, or evaluating it. But let us take them one-byone for ease of understanding.
Exploratory research
When you have chosen a topic to study, you may discover (after
reviewing the literature) that only a few or none have studied that topic.
For instance, when I heard news about the spate of bomb threats in Metro
Manila early last year, I became interested with bomb threats. So I read
books about these events and I searched in the internet for researches
about bomb threats. What I found was that most books dealt with how to
handle these events should they occur; and, although I found empirical
research (there were three of them) on bomb threats, all of these studies
concentrated on describing who are typical individuals who communicate
bomb threats against institutions and individuals; I found no study on the
patterns of bomb threats across space and time. So I explored the spatial
and temporal patterns of bomb threats in the Philippines (Barrera, 2015).
Exploratory research are aimed to study events that are little known, and
thus, of which the researcher has no previous expectations.
Often, however, the researcher uses qualitative methods in exploring
a research problem. Take for example what Jacobs (2012) did: He was
interested in carjacking and copresence of both the carjacker and the
victim. Specifically, he was interested in the tactics of carjackers to
consummate his/her planned taking of the victims car. However, after
reviewing the literature on robbery in general and carjacking in particular,
he learned that copresence in carjacking has not yet been fully studied.
Thus, he conducted an exploratory study by interviewing 24
unincarcerated carjackers in a US municipality.
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What is common in these examples is that the researcher usually

begins with a blank slate (Babbie, 2001) and proceeds to explore possible
rich information to build a baseline information about the topic. This type
of research often breaks new grounds, thereby contributing new insights
and areas to study for other researchers. However, as I pointed above,
exploratory studies may at times employ description, explanation, and
evaluation studies (usually for new policies).
Descriptive research
Another purpose of research is description. Descriptive research
aims to describe precisely the dimensions of a phenomenon. This type of
research answers questions like: What is the average number of police
officers in the police stations in Negros Oriental? What is the average
caseload of police investigators in Negros Oriental? What are the hot spots
of carnapping in Dumaguete City? How does a typical crime scene
investigation take place? Results of descriptive research are also aimed to
inform policies. For example, to formulate information-based programs to
curb drug abuse in the country, the Dangerous Drugs Board (2008)
conducted surveys that are aimed to describe the current situation of drug
abuse among Filipinos. Also, a chief of police may ask a report on the hot
spots of crime in his jurisdiction on which police patrol are directed.
Explanatory research
Instead of answering questions such as what is/are or how,
explanatory research answers why questions. This type of research,
however, may first describe a phenomenon, say crime, and proceeds to
explain why such phenomenon occur. Research in criminology and
criminal justice abounds with explanatory research. For example, after
findings that some barangays are hot spots of violent crimes, the
researcher may attempt to explain why such hot-spotting occurs. He/she
may use variables such as poverty incidence or population mobility. While
finding that poor neighborhoods have higher violent crime levels than rich
neighborhoods, the researcher may proceed to another why question.
This is what Sampson, Raudenbush and Earls (1997) did: They use the
concept of collective efficacy to explain why such pattern occurs. They
defined collective efficacy as social cohesion among neighbors combined
with their willingness to intervene on behalf of the common good
(Sampson et al., 1997: 918).
Evaluation research
Almost every year there is a new program in the agencies that
constitute the criminal justice system. However, in order to avoid wasting
resources by an ineffective programs continued implementation, policy
21
makers and researchers must evaluate the effectiveness of criminal justice

programs, whether they achieve what they intended to achieve. Earlier, we
discussed the experimental study of Kelling et al. (1975) to assess the
effectiveness of random patrol. Another classic example was the study of
Greenwood and Petersilia (1975). One of the earliest studies on the
ineffectiveness of criminal investigation in the reduction of crime was
conducted in the early 1970s by Greenwood and Petersilia (1975). They
found out that investigative training, staffing, workload, and procedures,
organization in the investigation division of all law enforcement agencies
in the US that had 150 or more employees did not significantly increased
chances of arrests, clearance rates, and did not reduce crime. These
findings led them to conclude that reactive investigation does not work in
reducing crime. A recent example of evaluation research is the study of
Ratcliffe et al. (2011) in Philadelphia. Ratcliffe and his colleagues assessed
the effectiveness of foot patrol in reducing crime in violent crime hot spots.
In sum, evaluation research assesses the effects of a social programs,
including criminal justice policies.
Who am I going to study?
When you design research it is important to determine in advance
who or what to be studied or observed in order not to confuse readers of
your research report and avoid pitfalls in generalization. This section deals
with the unit of analysis in a research study. We can define units of
analysis as those things we examine in order to create summary
descriptions of all such units and to explain differences among them
(Babbie, 2001). For instance, if you want to study sexual violence in a
prison facility, the unit of analysis could be the prisoners who experienced
sexual victimization. If you want to study confession during police
interrogation, the unit of analysis could be incarcerated prisoners. Or, if
you want to study crime levels across places, you could study barangays.
Probably, you might have realized now that the number of unit of
analysis seems almost limitless, thereby affording you an almost limitless
number of research study to make (Babbie, 2001). Let us take for example
the study of crime levels across places. The spatial distribution of crime
can be studied at different spatial units (Brantingham & Brantingham,
1997). You can study crime concentration across streets, neighborhoods,
barangays, cities/municipalities, provinces, regions, countries, continents
(and if possible, planets!). If you study crime concentration across streets,
you are to compare the crime levels of each street in you study area (city
or neighborhoods) the unit of analysis is street. If you study crime
concentration across cities/municipalities, you are to compare the crime
levels
of
each
city/municipality
in
your
study
area
(province/region/country) the unit of analysis is city/municipality.
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Here are some common units of analysis in criminology and criminal

justice (Maxfield & Babbie, 2005):
Individuals. Some criminologists are interested in studying
individuals suspects, victims, police officers, correctional officers, arson
investigators, judges, civilians, among others. Lambert et al. (2012), for
example, studied job burnout among prison staff. They did this study by
surveying all prison staff in a high security Midwestern state prison in
USA. The unit of analysis in their study was a prison staff. Another
example is the study of Hartwig et al. (2004) on lie detection accuracy.
Hartwig and his colleagues assessed the effectiveness of police officers in
lie detection by conducting an experiment on 30 psychology students (as
subjects) and 30 experienced police officers in interrogation (as
interrogators). Their unit of analysis was a police officer.
Groups. We can also study and compare groups characteristics
when doing research in crime and justice. For example, if we are interested
in the differences of the modus operandi of different robbery gangs, our
unit of analysis in the gang. Thus, we are to compare Gang #1, Gang #2,
Gang #3 and so on to see how they differ in perpetrating robberies. Other
examples of groups in criminology and criminal justice include
households, barangays, cities, provinces, regions, among others. However,
you might realize that these groups are composed of individuals. But you
should note that it is not the individuals we would be comparing, but their
aggregates or groups. For example, Morenoff, Sampson & Raudenbush
(2001) predicted homicide rates in 343 neighborhoods in Chicago using
neighborhood inequality and collective efficacy. Of course, the perpetrators
of homicides were individuals but the researchers did not study individual
homicide rates but the aggregates of homicide at the neighborhood level in
Chicago. They, in turn, compared neighborhoods in terms of homicide
rates, neighborhoods inequality levels, and collective efficacy levels.
Organizations. Some interesting units of analysis in criminology are
political and social organizations. These organizations include police
stations, jails, prisons, and courts. Similar to groups, organizations are
composed of individuals but we would be studying not the individuals but
their aggregates the organizations. One example is the study of Zhao and
Hassell (2005) on 304 large (with 100 or more officers) police agencies in
the US. They compared this police agencies in terms of their policing styles
and organizational priorities.
Social artifacts. Another common unit of analysis in criminology
and criminal justice are social artifacts. Social artifacts are products of
social beings and their behavior (Maxfield & Babbie, 2005: 92). These
units include newspapers, police crime reports, investigation reports, and
court decisions from which information about crime and justice are
23
written. One good example studying this kind of social artifact is the study
of Zaitsu (2010) on bomb threat offenses in Japan. He analyzed
investigative documents containing 101 cases and offenders. Other
examples of social artifacts as units of analysis include cars, motorcycles,
buildings, and streets.
Being aware of your unit of analysis is important to avoid the
ecological fallacy and reductionism in research (Babbie, 2001; Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005). Ecological fallacy occurs when a researcher uses his
findings on the characteristics of groups to explain characteristics of
individuals. For example, when you compare cities in terms of homicide
rates and poverty incidence and you find poorer cities having higher
homicide rates, it is an ecological fallacy to conclude that poor individuals
are violent compared with rich individuals. In this case, you do not really
know who committed the killings in poor cities; it might be possible that
rich individuals are responsible for the large proportion of those killings.
Thus, you can only say that poor cities tend to have higher homicide rates
compared with rich cities.
Likewise, we all know that among the three island groups (Luzon,
Visayas, and Mindanao) in the Philippines, Mindanao has the highest level
of bombing incidence. However, you would commit a fallacy when you
conclude that Dapitan City (a city in Mindanao) has higher bombing
incidence than any city in Metro Manila, Luzon. It is because bombings in
Mindanao are not randomly scattered across all cities in its islands; rather,
bombings are clustered in few cities/municipalities other than Dapitan
(Relatorres et al., 2013).
Aside from ecological fallacy, be careful not to commit its opposite
individualistic fallacy. This fallacy occurs when one generalizes his/her
observation about an individual to groups or organizations. For example,
when one hears from the news that a certain police officer has been found
positive of using dangerous drug, it is a fallacy to generalize and say: I am
afraid to report to the police station drug crimes in my neighborhood
because the police are even involved in drug use.
Another pitfall in research involving units of analysis is
reductionism that occurs when researchers try to disregard other units
of analysis and concepts from other fields. This is sometimes the case for
crime causation because criminology is a multidisciplinary study that
involves researchers from criminology, criminal justice, sociology,
mathematics, biology, economics, chemistry, and political science, to
name a few. Some researchers may limit their focus on what tend to cause
crime. Economist might focus only on cost and benefits (economic
reductionism); biologists might focus on genetic influences (biological
reductionism); and sociologists might focus on cultural factors
24
(sociological reductionism). Also, some researchers focus solely on one unit

of analysis and discredit other units. For example, some psychologists
focusing on the individual might argue that those researchers studying
variation of crimes across geographic areas run the risk of committing
ecological fallacy. Or, those focusing on places might discredit those
researchers studying individuals. These acts result to reductionism of
units of analysis and concepts on crime causation. We should note,
however, that crime occurs because of multiple processes both in the
individual and group level. Studying crime and justice, therefore, requires
focus on different units of analysis and concepts.
How many times should I collect data?
Because of theoretical and logistical restrictions, researchers
carefully choose between two time dimensions of observations: crosssectional studies and longitudinal studies (Babbie, 2001; Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005).
Cross-sectional studies
Almost all studies cited so far in this module are cross-sectional
studies. Cross-sectional studies collect data at one time, or the data
collected cover only one short period, say one year to two year city crime
data. By choosing this type of study, researchers can save a lot of their
time, effort, energy, and, of course, money. One classic example in place
and crime research is the study of Sherman, Gartin and Buerger (1989)
on the spatial distribution of predatory crimes in Minneapolis, USA. They
analyzed crime data from December 15, 1985 to December 15, 1986 and
found that only 3% of the city streets accounted for 50% of predatory
crimes. Note that they only studied one year crime data; thus this is a
cross-sectional study. Most surveys are also cross-sectional in nature. For
example, the Dangerous Drugs Board conducted a national survey on the
drug use situation in the Philippines in 2008; a data gatherer surveyed a
particular respondent at one time only. The ease of administering crosssectional studies makes it attractive to some researchers who wish to
explore, describe, or explain a phenomenon.
However, this type of study provides weak evidence when the
researcher wishes to investigate causation. To argue that one variable (e.g.
low self-control) causes another (e.g. violent crime), three requirements are
needed correlation between the two variables, the causal variable
precedes the effect, and the relationship must not be spurious (Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005). Cross-sectional studies seem limited in complying with the
second requirement. Cross-sectional studies cannot establish that the
independent variable, say low self-control, precedes crime because the
25
data are collected at one time only. This limitation is what some
longitudinal studies are trying to fulfill.
Longitudinal studies
Some researchers use data collected through longitudinal studies.
Longitudinal studies collect data from a respondent over a long period of
time or the data cover a long period of time, say 10 or more years (Babbie,
2001; Maxfield & Babbie, 2005). There are three major types of
longitudinal studies trend studies, panel studies, and cohort studies.
Trend studies display the changes of the frequency of an event over
a long period of time. A city mayor, for example, may request a report from
the chief of police to show the crime rate trend in his city to see the overall
picture of crime in terms of 10 or 20 years. Above, we discussed the study
of Sherman et al. (1989) on the spatial distribution of crimes in
Minneapolis for one year; however, this study may suffer from a snapshot
effect. They cannot really tell whether the distribution remains true in a
range of years. To overcome that limitation, Weisburd et al. (2004)
conducted a longitudinal study on crime concentration in Seattle, USA
from 1989 2002. Their study confirmed the earlier findings of Sherman
et al. (1989) that crime are non-random and concentrated in few areas of
the city even up to 14 years.
Criminologists who study causes of crime tend favor longitudinal
panel studies which collect data from the same sample respondents for 2
or more periods of time. For example, Thornberry et al. (1994) used the
data collected by the Rochester Youth Development Study in US to test the
propositions of interactional theory of crime. They used the data collected
in the Wave 2, 3, and 4 of the study. In Wave 2, adolescents were
interviewed in their 8th or 9th grade; in Wave 4, these same adolescents
were interviewed in their 10th grade.
Finally, in cohort studies researchers specific subpopulations, or
cohorts, as they change over time (Babbie, 2001). This type of study is
similar to panel study in which collection of data from respondents are
done in two or more periods. However, one major difference between panel
and cohort studies is that in panel studies researchers collect data from
the same respondent over time; while in cohort studies, researchers collect
from another sample of cohorts and, thus, not necessarily the same
respondents with the first data collection. For instance, if you want to
study a cohort of babies born in Dumaguete City in 2010, you generate a
sample of 500 out of 2000 babies. In 2015, you conduct another data
collection; this time, you generate another 500 five year old children born
in 2010 in the City. Then, you do the same procedure in 2020, 2025, and
26
2030. Note that by generating another sample of 500 children, it is not

necessary that the same respondents in the first sampling are chosen in
the second sampling of respondents. The only important criterion is that
the respondents were of the same subpopulation (in this case, those babies
born in 2010).
However, there are times when criminologists attempt to
approximate longitudinal studies using cross-sectional studies. This is
because longitudinal research is more expensive, time consuming, and
energy exhaustive than cross-sectional studies. For example, Gottfredson
and Hirschi (1990) state that the cause of having low self-control is poor
parenting styles during the first eight years of a child. To study this,
researchers would conduct a longitudinal study. They may collect data
about the parenting styles of parents at several periods when the child
ages below eight years old; and collect data on self-control level of the child
at several periods when he/she ages above eight. However, some
researchers do not have enough funding to conduct a longitudinal study
(which could possibly amount to millions!). Thus, some researchers resort
to retrospective studies to approximate longitudinal ones.
Retrospective research asks people to recall their pasts (Maxfield
& Babbie, 2005: 99). This is what Morris, Wood & Dunaway (2007) did: To
test whether parenting styles affected levels of self-control among
American Indians, they asked high school students on the parenting styles
of their parents when they were younger. One limitation of this method,
however, is that the respondents might not remember totally how they
were supervised by their parents when they were younger; instead, the
students response might reflect the current parenting styles of their
parents during the time of the survey. Nevertheless, when longitudinal
data is not available nor accessible, this method is acceptable, but the
researchers must point out this in their research article as one of the
limitations.
How should I collect the data?
Finally, we have arrived at the last major consideration in designing
a research study. After deciding what your research is for, who or what to
be studied, and when to collect data, you might ask: How should I collect
the data I need? To answer this question, you should first familiarize
different research methods. A research method is a process of collecting
the data needed to answer a particular research problem or question. You
can choose from a range of quantitative research methods such as
experiment, survey, and secondary data analysis and qualitative research
methods such as narrative research, phenomenology, grounded theory,
ethnography, and case study (Babbie, 2001; Creswell, 2007; Fraenkel &
Wallen, 2006; Maxfield & Babbie, 2005).
27
Note, however, that none of these methods is superior to another

method. Your choice depends on your research problem. For example, if
you want to determine the effectiveness of different policing strategies in
reducing crime at crime hot spots, it is obvious that you need an
experiment (you cannot do this using a survey). If you want to determine
the perceptions of police officers on their job assignments, you should use
a survey. And, if you want to study the techniques of budol-budol gang on
how they commit deceits against passive victims, then you can use
qualitative case study or phenomenological study. In this case, you cannot
conduct an experiment or a random survey because the population frame
of budol-budol gang members is not known.
Quantitative methods
In Lesson 2, I introduced you to a research approach called
quantitative research. As you can remember, this research approach is
oriented towards the use of numerical data. There is an array of
quantitative research methods used in criminology and criminal justice,
but we will only discuss the most common ones survey, secondary data
analysis, and experiment.
Surveys
Perhaps, the most common quantitative research methods in
criminology and criminal justice is survey research. Survey research is a
research method that collects data from a sample of a population by asking
questions in order to describe some characteristics of that population
(Bachman & Schutt, 2006; Fraenkel & Wallen, 2006). Survey is one of the
oldest method of research methods (Babbie, 2001) and is often used for
descriptive as well as explanatory research in criminology and criminal
justice (Maxfield & Babbie, 2005). One drawback of surveys, however, is
that respondents might not tell the truth; this is common especially in
criminological research which asks the criminal acts of the respondents.
Since conducting an experiment on crime and justice issues is
oftentimes unethical, criminologists use surveys to test theories. For
example, Agnew (1992) asserts that persons who experience strain
(negative events) in their lives are likely pushed towards delinquency. You
cannot do an experiment by sampling individuals and letting half
experience negative events while the other half do not experience such
events, and then watch whether those who experienced negative events
indeed commit crimes. This is desirable but purely unethical!
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Secondary data analysis

There are times, however, that researchers can take advantage of
readily available data though secondary data analysis. In secondary data
analysis, researchers analyze data that have been routinely collected by
different criminal justice agencies or other organizations that conduct
surveys. The researcher can save a lot of resources through this method.
Some of the studies I have cited in this module used secondary data. For
example, Sherman et al. (1989) collated and analyzed data from
Minneapolis computer-aided police dispatch system to study the hot spots
of predatory crime. Some agencies in the Philippine criminal justice system
can provide rich data for your research; these include the Philippine
National Police, Bureau of Jail Management and Penology, Bureau of Fire
Protection, Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, National Bureau of
Investigation. Other agencies outside the criminal justice system (e.g.
National Statistics Office, City Civil Registrar, City Engineers Office,
Traffic Management Office, and private agencies that provide assistance to
victims of abuse) can also give you data. You can also locate internet
databases (e.g. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime website
www.unodc.org) that gives data on criminology and criminal justice issues.
Experiments
Perhaps, the gold standard in research is the experimental method.
Experimental research investigates whether an independent variable
(e.g. police patrol) produces an effect on another variable (e.g. homicide
rate) by manipulating the independent variable (Babbie, 2001; Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005; Fraenkel & Wallen, 2006). One classic example of
experiment in criminology and criminal justice is the study of Kelling et al.
(1974) which we have already discussed in previous lessons. Here is what
Kelling et al. (1974) did in Kansas City:
Initially, they randomly divided the 15 beats of South Patrol Division
into three groups.
Then, five beats were designated as reactive groups; another five
beats as control groups; finally, the remaining beats as proactive groups.
However, they made sure that none of the reactive beats were contiguous.
Next, they applied different dosage of mobile police patrol in each
group. In the reactive beats, police patrol was withdrawn; police officers
only went to the beats when someone calls them for help. In the control
beats, the normal patrol effort - one patrol car was conducting preventive
patrol. In the proactive beats, the dosage of patrol was increased to two or
three times.
29
To measure the effects of the experiment they gathered data (before,

during, and after the experiment) on monthly reported crime, victimization
experiences, attitudes and fear of crime from household members,
victimization experiences and satisfaction with the police from businesses,
police-citizen encounters, traffic accidents, arrests, and police response
time.
You might notice that Kelling and his associates also used surveys
to collect information on community members perceptions and
experiences before, during, and after the experiment even though they
were using primarily experimental method. It should be noted that using
multiple methods can strengthen a particular research project. In the case
of Kelling et al. (1974), effectiveness of preventive patrol was not only
measured in terms of crimes reported to the police but also on other
measures of effectiveness like unreported crimes, fear of crime, and
satisfaction with the police services. With this, they speculated that they
could provide a more comprehensive evaluation of random preventive
patrol.
Qualitative research methods
Some criminology and criminal justice researchers also use
qualitative methods in studying crime and justice related problems.
Qualitative researchers often argue that quantitative techniques are
superficial; thus, they turn to analyzing participants words and actions.
Among the most common qualitative research methods are narrative
research, phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography, and case study
(Creswell, 2006).
Narrative research
Narrative research is often used in doing research in crime and
justice issues, especially when trying to let criminal justice actors tell their
stories. Narrative research is a qualitative method that explores the life
of an individual/s through interviews and collection of documents
(Creswell, 2006). This type of research tells the story of one or more
individuals life. In criminological research, criminal justice actors (e.g.
criminals) are often given a chance to tell their stories using their own
perspectives. The researcher then looks for themes and restory the
participants life. For example, Dilmon and Timor (2014) conducted a
narrative research on 12 men serving sentences for killing their female
partners in Ramla, Israel. The men were made to express how they
perceive, describe, and explain the murder of their partners (Dilmon and
Timor, 2014).
30
Phenomenology
Another qualitative research that is gaining attention in criminology
is phenomenological research methods. Phenomenology studies several
individuals who have experienced the same phenomenon and attempts to
extract the essence of their lived experience commonly through interviews
(Creswell, 2006). The essence is focuses on the common experiences of
the participants (Creswell, 2006:62). Unlike narrative research which
often studies only one participant, phenomenological researchers conduct
interviews on 5 to 25 respondents. One example of phenomenology is the
study of Narag, Maxwell, & Lee (2013) on 20 participants of a Driving
Under the Influence or Driving While Impaired (DUI/DWI) Court program
in the US. The participants, who had at least two drunk-driving offense
volunteered to undergo the program. By using phenomenological inquiry,
Narag and his colleagues found that the program was effective in reforming
the offenders. The participants viewed generally the program facilitators
as friendly, supporting and caring. These experiences help most
participants to successfully complete the 36-week program.
Grounded theory
There are times, however, when criminologist and criminal justice
researchers want to build a theory based on the views of research
participants. These researchers would need to use grounded theory to
explain processes and actions of the participants. Grounded theory is a
qualitative inquiry that employs interviews and aims to develop a theory
based on the views of several participants. This type of study uses
interviews of 20-60 individuals. Lopez and Emmer (2000) uses grounded
theory in building a theory on delinquent crime contexts upon learning
that theories of delinquency concentrated more on individual differences
as causes of crime and neglected situational precipitators of serious
juvenile offending. To generate the crime contexts that most likely pushed
juveniles to commit serious offenses, they conducted semi-structured
interviews on 24 male juvenile offenders at the Texas Youth Commission.
Participants were asked to recall and share their experiences when they
committed a crime; then additional, probes of 5Ws and 1H were used to
elicit information on the immediate, situational contexts in which
offenders were motivated to commit a serious offense. Grounded theory is
helpful when the researcher wishes to provide a theoretical framework
grounded on participants own views.
31
Ethnography
Sometimes, in order to obtain more in-depth analysis of a
phenomenon, some researchers go beyond snapshot qualitative research
(e.g. narrative, phenomenology, grounded theory) and use ethnographic
research. Ethnography is a qualitative inquiry that describes and
interprets the patterns of a groups culture over time (Creswell, 2006). To
describe the culture of a group, the researcher conducts observation
techniques, interviews, and sometimes, collects other sources of data, for
an extended period of time. One good example is the study of Valdez and
Sifaneck (2004) on Mexican-American gang members in drug markets. Of
course, there is no official list of gang members and gang members are
hard to access for a survey; thus, Valdez and Sifaneck (2004) used
ethnographic research using field observations and interviews. Field work
in their study lasted for four years. In two areas in a US Southwestern city,
two indigenous field workers conducted social mapping for six months to
identify the gangs and the places they frequented. After this, the field
workers entered into the social networks of these gangs. The field workers
then recorded rich information through field notes while conducting field
observations, and later, conducted interviews on known gang members
about their role in drug selling and drug use patterns. Ethnographic
research is appropriate when enough resources are available and
researchers wish to have a more in-depth analysis of a groups culture.
Case study
Finally, some researchers use case study in criminological research.
Case study is a qualitative inquiry on an issue or problem by conducting
in-depth analysis on an individual/s, event, program, or activity (case/s).
Similar to other qualitative research methods, case study researchers use
extensive observations, interviews, and documentary analysis on a case or
cases. To study the problems and challenges facing crime task forces,
Philipps and Orvis (1999) used the intergovernmental relations conceptual
framework in examining East Texas Violent Crime Task Force. They used
semi-structured interviews on members and administrators of the said
task force, and they also gathered and analyzed legal documents and
memoranda concerning the task force. After these, they discussed the
problems and challenges facing crime task forces using the East Texas
Violent Crime Task Force as an example.
Summary
In this lesson, we have learned what the major considerations are
when we design research in criminology and criminal justice. After
deciding our topic of interest, we decide what the purpose of our research
32
is exploratory, description, explanation, or evaluation. We also decide

who or what (units of analysis) we are going to study individuals, groups,
organizations, or social artifacts. Another consideration is when (time
dimension) we should collect data at one period (cross-sectional) or at
two or more periods (longitudinal). Finally, we decide how (research
methods) we collect the data quantitative (surveys, secondary analysis,
or
experiments)
or
qualitative
methods
(narrative
research,
phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography, or case study). All of these
considerations, however, are affected by the amount of your resources,
background, skills, and preferences. My final reminder to you is that: None
of the alternatives is the best; it just depends on your research problem.
33
LESSON 3 TUTORIAL
Before you begin Lesson 3 Exercises, familiarize first how to find and
download research articles from Google Scholar. Scholar is a search engine
similar to Youtube (which enable you to search view videos); however,
instead of videos, Scholar enables you to search for academic articles (e.g.
research articles) and books. You just have to type in its search bar the
key words of the research with which you are interested. Please try this
short tutorial; it will help you in the succeeding exercise/s. Note that
Google Chrome browser was used to create this tutorial. Thus, if you can,
use Google Chrome for this tutorial.
1. Go to Google.com.
2. Type Google Scholar and Click Google Scholar.
3. Type in the search bar your query term. For example, self-control
theory crime. Click search button.
34
4. Many items will appear after the search. See for example the results
below. Look at the 2nd item entitled, Criminal victimization and
low self-control: An extension and test of a general theory of crime.
You can see this phrase on its right: [PDF] from researchgate.net.
This phrase indicates that there is a free pdf copy of the research
hosted in researchgates site. Click this phrase and it will be
downloaded.
5. A pdf file will appear just like the one encircled below. Click it once and
save it into your USB device for printing and reading.
35
6. Sometimes the pdf file will automatically open like the one shown
below. Just hover your cursor to the lower right corner of the
screen and these tool bars
will appear. To save the
document, just click the 2nd to the last button.
36
LESSON 3 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
Now, you are to demonstrate what you have learned in this lesson. Please
list five titles of criminological research articles and describe its research
design by filling out the table below. Use the articles that you have
downloaded using Google Scholar.
Title of research
Purpose of
the study
Unit of
analysis
Time
Research
Dimension method
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
37
References
Wadsworth
Bachman, R. & Schutt, R. (2006). Fundamentals of research in
criminology and criminal justice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications,
Inc.
Barrera, D.J. (2015). Bomb threats and reports of suspicious items in the
Philippines: Spatial and temporal patterns. Forthcoming in Security
Journal.
Brantingham, P.L. & Brantingham, P.J. (1997). Mapping crime for
analytic purposes: Location quotients, counts, and rates. In D. Weisburd
& T. McEwen (Eds), Crime mapping and crime prevention. Monsey, NY:
Willow Tree Press, Inc.
Creswell, J. (2007). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing
among five approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
d%20Survey.pdf
Dilmon, R. & Timor, U. (2014). The narrative of men who murder their
partners: How reliable is it? International Journal of Offender Therapy and
Comparative Criminology, 58(10): 1125-1149.
Greenwood, P. & Petersilia, J. (1975). The criminal investigation process.
The Rand Corporation.
Hartwig, M. Granhag, P.A., Strmwall, L. & Vrij, A. (2004). Police officers
lie detection accuracy. Police Quarterly, 7(4): 429-456.
38
Jacobs, B. (2012). Carjacking and copresence. Journal of Research in

Crime and Delinquency, 49(4): 471-488.
Foundation.
Lambert, E., Hogan, N., Dial, K.C., Jiang, S. & Khondaker, M. (2012). Is
job burning me out? An exploratory test of the job characteristics model
on the emotional burnout of prison staff. The Prison Journal, 92(3): 3-23.
Lopez, V. & Emmer, E. (2000). Adolescent male offenders: A grounded
theory study of cognition, emotion, and delinquent crime contexts.
Criminal Justice and Behavior, 27(3):292-311.
Morenoff, J., Sampson, R., Raudenbush, S. (2001). Neighborhood
inequality, collective efficacy, and the spatial dynamics of urban violence.
Criminology, 39(3): 517-559.
Narag, R. Maxwell, S.R. & Lee, B. (2013). A phenomenological approach to
assessing a DUI/DWI program. International Journal of Offender therapy
and Comparative Criminology, 57(2): 229-250.
Philipps, P. & Orvis, G. (1999). Intergovernmental relations and the crime
task force: A case study of the East Texas Violent Crime Task Force and
its implications. Police Quarterly, 2(4): 438-461.
Ratcliffe, J., Taniguchi, T., Groff, E. & Wood, J. (2011). The Philadelphia
foot patrol experiment: A randomized controlled trial of police patrol
effectiveness in violent crime hot spots. Criminology, 49(3): 795-831.
Relatorres, Q.H., Barrera, D.J., Napao, J. & Susada, J. (2013). Bombings
and violence on Mindanao: A fractal analysis. Recoletos Multidisciplinary
Research Journal, 1(2), 101-109.
Sampson, R., Raudenbush, S. & Earls, F. (1997). Neighborhoods and
violent crime: A multilevel study of collective efficacy. Science, 277(): 918924.
Sherman, L., Gartin, P. & Buerger, M. (1989). Hot spots of predatory
crime: Routine activities and the criminology of place. Criminology, 27(1):
27-55.
39
Thornberry, T., Lizotte, A., Krohn, M., Franworth, M. & Jang, S. J.

(1994). Delinquent peers, beliefs, and delinquent behavior: A longitudinal
test of interactional theory. Criminology, 32(1): 47-83.
Weisburd, D., Bushway, S., Lum, C. & Yang, S. (2004). Trajectories of
crime at places: A longitudinal study of street segments in the city of
Seattle. Criminology, 42(2): 283-321.
Zaitsu, W. (2010). Bomb threats and offender characteristics in Japan.
Journal of Investigative Psychology and Offender Profiling, 7(1), 75-89.
40
LESSON 4
FORMULATING THE PROBLEM
After successfully learning major considerations when we design
research, let us embark on the steps in the research process. We outlined
the major steps in conducting research in Lesson 1. We start doing
research by defining our research problem. Next, we design our research
to answer our problem. After carefully contemplating on how to execute
our inquiry, we then proceed to collect, analyze and interpret the data we
need. Finally, we write a journal article to let others know the research
problem we successfully solve. To start, we shall now learn how to
formulate our research problem the most important step in research.
make your own research problem; and

create hypothesis out of your problem.
Key terms
Area of interest
Frame of reference
Topic
Research problem
Research question
Hypothesis
What is my area of interest and topic for investigation?

To formulate your research problem, you should first decide what
your area of high interest is in criminology. From this, you can decide what
topic you can delve. For example, if your interest is in criminal etiology,
then you can choose crime causation using one or combine two or more
perspectives to explain crime. You may choose self-control theory as your
theoretical framework. If you are interested with law enforcement
administration, you may delve on human resources (the police officers).
From there, you can study things that could have an impact if fully
understood, for example stress and job burnout or police misconduct. If
you are into corrections, you may study interactions between prison/jail
staff and inmates. We can fully illustrate this using the Table 1 below. As
you can see, research problems seem limitless. If they were limited,
research projects would have already stopped, and nobody would be doing
research now.
41
Table 1. Topic for investigation matrix.

Area of
interest
Frame of reference
Unit of analysis
Topic for investigation
Environmental
criminology, Rational
choice perspective
Person
Decision-making of offenders
Streets
Hot spots/hot times of crime
Neighborhoods
Criminal
etiology
Criminal sociology
Cities
Groups (Gangs)
Persons
Policing
strategy
Social disorganization,
collective efficacy, fear of crime,
social disorder and crime, and
crime rates
collective efficacy, and crime
rates
Subculture, social learning
Strain, social control, parenting
and crime
Genes and crime, exposure to
chemicals and crime, diet and
crime
Aggression, self-control,
personality and crime
Biological/chemical
criminology
Persons
Psychological
criminology
Persons
Deterrence
Neighborhoods,
streets
Hot spots patrol, reactive patrol
Community relations
Neighborhoods
Community policing,
neighborhood watch
Problem-oriented
Zero-tolerance
Neighborhood,
streets
Neighborhoods,
streets
Persons
Community-based
Rehabilita
tion
Formal
organizations
Persons
Institutional based
Formal
organizations
Persons
Restorative justice
Formal
Organization
Judiciary
Retributive justice
Persons
Organizations
Problem-oriented policing,
Broken windows policing
Characteristics of probationers,
recidivism
Parole and probation
management
Recidivism of offenders, job
burn out of prison staff, morale
Prison population and violent
disorders, prison morale
Mediation, conciliation,
arbitration of offenders and
victims
Barangay justice system
Judges decisions, plea
bargaining between the
accused and offended party
Speed of trial of different courts
42
Table 1 shows four of the many areas of interest on which

criminological researchers could explore. As seen, from one area of interest
topics of investigation seem limitless. This is possible through the frames
of reference and units of analysis. For instance, if you want to explain
crime, you can choose among the possible units of analysis persons,
streets, neighborhoods, or cities. You can choose to explain why some
persons commit more crimes than others; why some streets have more
crimes; or why some cities and so on. The choice of explanatory factors in
turn depends on the frames of reference. A frame of reference is a
perspective that a researcher uses in dealing a topic (Champion, 1993).
For example, in explaining crime, one can choose one among several
perspectives environmental criminology, biological, and chemical,
psychological, sociological. If he/she chooses the sociological perspective
and neighborhoods as units of analysis, he can use the social
disorganization theory to explain why some neighborhoods have higher
crimes compared with other neighborhoods. (Please see Appendix A for
other topics in criminology and criminal justice; the list, however, is not
exhaustive.
What is my problem statement?
From your topic, you can then formulate your research problem.
This step is the most important step in the research process because a
problem that is clearly stated is already half-solved. Your research problem
will then dictate your research design who or what to study, when, where,
and how (Kothari, 2004). Without a research problem, you will certainly
have no direction and you may tend to collect all sorts of data without
purpose (Booth, Colomb & Williams, 2003).
In Lesson 1, we learned that research can solve practical problems
(e.g. crime) through solving or answering research problems (e.g. when,
where, how, or why crimes occur?). We also learned in Lesson 1 that
research problems are things which the researcher do not know about a
certain practical problem, or if he/she knows, he/she wants others to
know. We will illustrate in the next subsections how to frame our research
problems in descriptive and explanatory research.
A. Exploratory/Descriptive research
Suppose that your area of interest is in criminal etiology, your frame
of reference is environmental criminology, and your topic is patterns of
crime and you choose motor vehicle theft as your crime of choice, then
your research problem pertains to the things we do not know about motor
vehicle theft, say, in Negros Oriental. These things that you do not know
(research problems) are sometimes stated as questions (Fraenkel &
Wallen, 2006). When we say, Things we do not know, we mean
43
information which have not been researched and published in a research

journal. Here are the steps is defining your research problem.
Step 1. Ask as many questions as you can.
The first thing we must do is to ask questions whose answers are
not yet known. Now, assume that we have arrived with the following
questions on the things that we do not know about motor vehicle theft in
the province of Negros Oriental (our study area):
1. Where do motor vehicle (MV) thefts occur frequently in Negros
Oriental?
2. When do MV theft occur frequently?
3. What are the usual hot products of MV theft?
4. How do offenders steal MV theft?
5. What are the personal characteristics of MV thieves?
6. What are the motives of MV thieves?
7. How do the victims contribute to MV theft commission?
8. What are the policing strategies employed by law enforcement
agencies to curb MV thefts?
9. Does poverty increase MV thefts in a city?
10. Does collective efficacy decrease MV theft?
These are just the few of the many (and limitless) questions that we
can ask ourselves about MV thefts in Negros Oriental. Because of space
limitations, we will just deal with these 10 questions for now.
Step 2. Eliminate unrelated/unrealistic/impractical questions
The next thing we should do now is to select questions according to
some criteria, as follows:
Think of your overall purpose. This time we are defining a research

problem for a descriptive study. We want questions whose answers
describe MV theft. Thus, questions that ask explanatory answers
must be eliminated. So we will eliminate Questions # 7, 9, and 10.
These questions are for explanatory research.
Think of your frame of reference. Your frame of reference is

environmental criminology. Environmental criminology is a
perspective that assumes that offenders are rational; opportunity
facilitates crimes; crime occurs when a motivated offender converges
with a suitable target in the absence of a capable guardian; and
places and times where this convergence usually occurs tend to be
the hot spots and hot times of crimes. With this, we can eliminate
44
Questions 9 & 10. These questions can be answered using the social
structure perspective (social disorganization theory).
Think of your topic. Your topic is patterns of crime; this time,

patterns of MV theft. Thus, we can eliminate Questions 8, 9 and 10.
These questions do not ask about patterns of crime. They are
unrelated to our topic.
Think of the available and accessible data on MV theft. Of course,

for a beginner like you, the easiest source is the law enforcement
agency (i.e. Philippine National Police Highway Patrol Group) that
handles MV theft cases in the province. Suppose that you have ask
permission from that agency and they provide you their data.
However, in their database only the (a) location of the theft, (b) the
year, month, day, time of the theft, (c) type, model, and make of
vehicle stolen are recorded. This is not surprising because most
databases were not built for research purposes. With these data,
what remains are Questions # 1, 2, and 3. You cannot answer the
other questions using the current data unless you conduct surveys
and qualitative research methods.
Step 3. Write your problem statement.
Always remember that a research problem is something that we do

not know yet or about which little is still known. You are left with three
questions Questions 1, 2 and 3. In journal articles, research problems
are often stated as purpose statement and specific questions follow this
statement like this one:
The purpose of this study is to explore the patterns of motor
vehicle (MV) theft across space, time, and targets. Specifically,
this study will answer these questions: (a) What are the hot
spots and hot times of MV thefts in Negros Oriental? and (b)
What are the hot products of MV theft in the province?
Problem statement
The purpose of this study is to explore the patterns of motor
vehicle (MV) theft across space, time, and targets.
Research questions
Specifically, this study will answer these questions: (a) What
are the hot spots and hot times of MV thefts in Negros
Oriental? and (b) What are the hot products of MV theft in the
province?
45
Now, review the how we came up with our problem statement

on motor vehicle theft in Negros Oriental. Table 2 shows the
topic for investigation matrix for motor vehicle theft.
Table 2. Topic for investigation matrix for motor vehicle theft.
Area of
interest
Frame of reference
Unit of analysis
Environmental
criminology, Rational
choice perspective
Person
Streets/specific
address
Decision-making of offenders
Hot spots/hot times of crime,
hot products
collective efficacy, fear of
crime, social disorder and
crime, and crime rates
collective efficacy, and crime
rates
Subculture, social learning
Strain, social control,
parenting and crime
Neighborhoods
Criminal
etiology
Criminal sociology
Cities
Groups (Gangs)
Persons
Examples of exploratory/descriptive problem statement

Here are some examples of problem statement of published research
articles in reputable criminology and criminal justice journals. Note that
they vary in style but still contain the problem statements.
1. Sherman, Gartin & Buerger (1989: 33)
Hot spots of predatory crime: Routine activities and the
criminology of place
This article examines that premise. Using street addresses and
intersections as an operational definition of urban places, we assess
police call data as a measure of place crime in Minneapolis. We
describe the distribution of crimes by place and test for the
randomness of that distribution. We then consider the implications
of the results for further development of a routine activities
criminology of place.
2. Weisburd et al. (2004: 286)

Trajectories of crime at places: A longitudinal study of street
segments in the city of Seattle
In this paper we use official crime data to examine the distribution
of crime at street segments in Seattle, Washington, over a 14-year
time period
46
3. Townsley, Johnson & Ratcliffe (2008: 140)

Space time dynamics of insurgent activity in Iraq
The following research paper outlines our attempts to study the
spatial and temporal patterns of insurgent attacks in Iraq during
U.S. military occupation.
4. Hickman et al. (2011: 229)

Mapping police stress
The purpose of the current study is to describe a methodology for
quantifying the physiological response to calls for service by means
of bio-feedback devices that record an individuals heart rate in
space-time
B. Explanatory research
This time, let us turn our attention to problem statements of
explanatory research. Assume that you are interested in explaining police
misconduct. Your broad question is: Why do some police officers commit
police misconduct or deviance? You might have a few hunches on the
answers to this question, and might think that termination of these officers
is the easiest and best solution. But as we know, prevention is better than
cure. Thus, it is important to determine in advance who are at risk of
committing police deviance. With this, police managers can anticipate on
police misconduct prevention programs.
This is an interesting but complex question. As you read the
literature especially previous research on police misconduct, you will
discover that previous researchers used different frames of reference or
perspectives in explaining why some are involved in police deviance. Using
one frame of reference, however, can provide focus on your investigation,
(and of course can lighten your load). See Table 3 for some frames of
reference on our current area of interest police misconduct. (Note that
this not an exhaustive list).
Suppose that you choose the individual level frame of reference.
Implications of this choice are: You will study persons as units of analysis
(police officers), and you will explain police misconduct using police
officers characteristics and attitudes.
Suppose again that after reading the literature, you discover that
previous studies already focused on some offender characteristics (e.g.
age, education, training, and experience) and if you do the same, your topic
might be overdone. However, you have found that no study has yet used
47
self-control to explain why some officers commit more police deviance

compared with their counterparts. This is what Donner and Jennings
(2014) successfully did: They used self-control to explain different forms
of police deviance for the first time.
Table 3. Topic for investigation matrix for police misconduct.
Area of
interest
Frame of reference
Organizational level
Police
misconduct
Unit of
analysis
Formal
organizations
Situational level
Persons
Individual level
Persons
Neighborhood level
Neighborhoods

Supervision, management
and police deviance
Victim characteristics, victimofficer relationship and
deviance
Officer characteristics: age,
training, education,
experience, peers, self-control
poverty, transition,
population heterogeneity,
collective efficacy
Formulation of problem statement

In explanatory research, the researcher goes beyond describing a
phenomenon, say, crime and proceeds to explain it. For example, you can
explain why some children commit crimes through differential association.
You can state that: Some children commit more crimes because they have
more delinquent peers. With this explanation, you are actually talking
about the relationship between the number of delinquent peers and the
number of crimes committed by children. Thus, in formulating research
problems in explanatory research, we ask questions entailing
relationships. Some example are presented below:
Do children who have more delinquent peers commit more crimes

than children who have fewer or no delinquent peers?
How do officer and neighborhood characteristics influence
the relationships between situational characteristics and
police behavior? (Sun, Payne & Wu, 2008: 25)
Do male and female police officers differ in their levels of job
satisfaction?
Since Donner and Jennings (2014) chose self-control to explain

police deviance, they needed to focus on the relationship between selfcontrol and police deviance in formulating their problem. They had only
one research question as shown below:
48
Acknowledging these issues, the current study contributes to

the literature by exploring the potential relationship between
low self-control and police misconduct. Specifically, the main
objective of this study is to investigate whether a police
officers level of self-control is significantly related to his/her
involvement in police misconduct. To this end, and building
upon the existing literature linking self-control to
occupational deviance (e.g., Gibson & Wright, 2001; Langton
et al., 2006), the current study uses a sample of 1,935 police
officers from the Philadelphia Police Department (PPD; Greene
& Piquero, 2004) to examine one central research question:
Does low self-control influence individual-level police
misconduct? (Donner & Jennings, 2014: 204-205)
Problem statement
Specifically, the main objective of this study is to investigate
whether a police officers level of self-control is significantly
related to his/her involvement in police misconduct.
Research question
Does low self-control
misconduct?
influence
individual-level
police
Examples of explanatory research problem statement

You will learn faster when you study how researchers formulate
their explanatory problem statements. Here are some examples:
1. Manis, Archbold & Hassell (2008: 510)
Exploring the impact of police officer education level on allegations of
police misconduct
The study presented in this paper responds to that call for additional
research by providing a contemporary look at the relationship between
police officers education levels and complaints of police misconduct. This
study is unique because it utilizes both formal and informal complaints
filed against police officers working in a Midwestern police agency. In
addition, this study also examines the impact of the type of college major
(Criminal Justice (CJ) major compared with non-CJ majors) on complaints
filed against patrol officers.
49
2. Pyrooz (2012: 491)

Structural covariates of gang homicide in large U.S. cities
This study addresses these shortcomings by advancing a macro-level
analysis of gang homicide in large U.S. cities. Herein, I seek to accomplish
two goals: (a) identify structural covariates of gang homicide, which will
extend the understanding of gang homicide from a localized (i.e., within
city) to a generalized (i.e., between-city) state of knowledge, thus providing
an explanation to why some cities have higher rates of gang homicide than
others and (b) examine whether structural covariates of gang homicide
differ from that of non-gang homicide, which will determine the extent to
which the conditions associated with gang homicide are consistent with
aggregate and disaggregated homicide studies.
3. de Guzman (2007: 32)

Integrity of civilian review: A contemporary analysis of complainants
and police officers views in the Philippines
Thus, this study analyzes the influences of the boards integrity on the
satisfaction of the police and complainants.
4. Hancock & Raeside (2009: 100)

Modeling factors central to recidivism: An investigation of sentence
management in Scottish Prison Service
In this article, we focus on the role of prisoner management, particularly
the processes associated with sentence management (SM), in the reduction
of recidivism.
From research question to research hypothesis

Often, in problem statements of explanatory studies, research
questions are stated as hypothesis (Pyrczak & Bruce, 1992). According to
Fraenkel and Wallen (2006: 46), A hypothesis is, simply put, a prediction
of the possible outcomes of a study. In other words, a hypothesis is the
tentative answer to a research question in an explanatory research. It
states the expected relationship between two variables (Dantzker &
Hunter, 2006), for example delinquent peers and delinquent acts.
For instance, if your research question is:
Do children who have more delinquent peers commit more
delinquent acts than children who have fewer or no delinquent
peers?
50
Your research hypothesis might be:

Children who have more delinquent peers tend to commit more
delinquent acts than children who have no or fewer delinquent
peers.
Obviously, a hypothesis is just our tentative answer to our research
question. It is this statement that we want to provide evidence for their
support using our research article. Looking back to our earlier examples
in criminal prosecution: It is like stating that Juan dele Cruz might have
committed the crime of murder against Juana dela Cruz. Then the
prosecutor will provide evidence to show some support for this claim.
There are, however, three types of hypothesis, namely: research
hypothesis, null hypothesis, and rival hypothesis (Dantzker & Hunter,
2006). A research hypothesis is the tentative answer to the research
question stating the relationship between two variables. Null hypothesis
states that there is no relationship between two variables. This hypothesis
is important in statistical inference. Although usually researchers state
the research hypothesis instead of the null hypothesis in journal articles,
it is the null hypothesis that researchers try to disprove using empirical
data. We can only say that our data supports our research hypothesis
when our data rejects the null hypothesis. (We will deal with this more in
our lessons on statistics). Finally, a rival hypothesis is arrived when the
data reject both the research hypothesis and the null hypothesis and
provides an alternative answer to the research question.
Summary
When we formulate our research question, we are in the most
important stage in the research process. As commonly known, a problem
clearly defined is half-solved. A research problem dictates our other
choices in designing our research project. A research problem is something
not known or less known by a research community. To formulate a
problem statement for a journal article, we need first to know our area of
interest and decide the frame of reference and units of analysis, and
narrow our topic upon which we are to build our problem. Often, however,
a research problem is expressed as a question or hypothesis. When we
state our research question, we are just asking what we do not know about
our topic. And, when we state the hypothesis, we are just answering our
question.
51
LESSON 4 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Go to Google Scholar and search for the article, Attitudes toward
the police: The effects of direct and vicarious experience. Read
the article and identity the
1.1 Problem statement
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
1.2 Research question/s
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
1.2 Hypotheses
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
52
LESSON 4 EXERCISES cont.

Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________
2. Do the same for the article, The Philadelphia foot patrol experiment:
a randomized controlled trial of police patrol effectiveness in violent

crime hotspots. Tip: Read the Abstract, Introduction, and Discussion
sections first.
2.1 Problem statement
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2.2 Research question/s
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2.2 Hypotheses
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
53
References
Booth, W., Colomb, G. & Williams, J. (2003). The craft of research. Chicago:
The University of Chicago.
Champion, D. (1993). Research methods for criminal justice and
criminology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
de Guzman, M. (2007). Integrity of civilian review: A contemporary analysis
of complainants and police officers views in the Philippines. Police Practice
and Research, 8(1): 31-45.
Hancock, P. & Raeside, R. (2009). Modeling factors central to recidivism:
An investigation of sentence management in Scottish Prison Service. The
Prison Journal, 89(1): 99-118.
Hickman, M., Fricas, J., Strom, K. & Pope, M. (2011). Mapping police
stress. Police quarterly, 14(3): 227-250.
Kothari, C.R. (2004). Research methodology: Methods and techniques.
Daryaganj, New Delhi: New Age International (P) Ltd., Publishers.
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55
LESSON 5
MEASUREMENT OF VARIABLES
After defining your problem, you shall now learn how to measure
variables you use to formulate your question. In criminology and criminal
justice, this is most of the time hard and complex unlike in the natural
sciences. In physics, for example, chemists can accurately and
consistently measure the weight, height, and width of an object. But in
criminology, we wonder how we can measure crime, self-control, strain,
burnout, satisfaction, fear of crime, and other variables of interest
accurately and consistently. Our ability to accurately and consistently
measure these variable is important because the empirical findings that
feed theoretical growth can hinge on how attentive we are to measurement
(Sullivan & McGloin, 2014: 448). This lesson will help you define and
measure variables to facilitate quantification and statistical analysis in
criminology and criminal justice.
After this reading this lesson, you shall be able to:
identify the indicators of variables;

create indexes and scales to measure variables; and
use scales created by others in your research.
Key terms
Variables
Attributes
Index
Scale
What are variables?

We had been talking about research problem, questions, and
hypothesis, and often you had come across the word, variable. We will
now define variables. Fraenkel and Wallen (2006: 40) posit: A variable is
a concept a noun that stands for variation within a class of objects . . .
Gender, self-control, and crime are variables because they vary across
subcategories. These subcategories are called attributes (see Table 4).
Table 4. Samples of variables and attributes.
Variables
Sex
Age
College year level
IQ
Self-control level
Number of crimes committed
Attributes
Female, Male
0, 1, 2, 3, 4 years
1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th year level
15, 30, 65, 90, 100, 115, 120, 160, 195 . . .
High 24 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Low (reverse coded)
None, 1 crime, 2 crimes, 3 crimes . . .
56
Kindly take a look at Table 4 again, what do you notice among the
variables? In what way do they differ? They differ in terms of the rank and
distance among their attributes. For instance, in terms of rank: female and
male cannot be ranked (no sex is higher than the other), while 1 year old
and 5 years old children can be ranked (a 5 year old child is older than the
1 year old). In terms of distance: female and male have no distance (since
they have no rank), while a 5 year old child is 4 years older than the 1 year
old (we can measure the distance which is 4 years). Because of these
differences, variables can then be divided into types, as follows (Babbie,
2001; Bachman & Schutt, 2006; Dantzker & Hunter, 2006):
Nominal variables comprise variables whose attributes differ but

have no rank order. Ex: Gender (female, male), Nationality (Filipino,
Australian, Canadian), court decision (guilty, not guilty), Types of
crime (murder, arson, rape), Crime commission (committed, not
committed). Male and female persons differ but have no rank (no
one is quantitatively higher than the other in terms of gender).
Ordinal variables comprise variables whose attributes differ, have

ranks but have no distance. Ex: College year level (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th
year), Crimes committed (None, 1-3 crimes, 4-5 crimes, 6-10
crimes), Social status (poor, middle income, rich family). In terms of
college year level, a 1st year student is different from a 4th year
student, the 4th year student has higher year level compared with
the 1st year student; however, we cannot really say how many more
subjects this 4th year student has taken compared with the 1st year
student by just basing on the year level data.
Interval variables comprise variables whose attributes differ, have

ranks and distance, but have no absolute zero point. Ex: IQ (20, 40,
65, 90, 100, 125), Temperature (-20C, -5C, -1C, 10C, 20 C),
Self-control (24, 25, 26 . . . 94, 95, 96). In terms of IQ, a person with
50 IQ differs from a person with 100 IQ, 100 IQ is higher than 50
IQ, 100 IQ is 50 more than 50 IQ, but we cannot say that 100 IQ is
twice as large as 50 IQ because there is no absolute zero. IQ,
Temperature, and self-control have no zero points. The value of zero
in these variables have no meaning; for example, 0 C does not really
mean there is no hotness or coldness; there is no 0 IQ; and it is
impossible to find a person with 0 self-control who cannot control
himself at all times.
Ratio variables comprise variables whose attributes differ, have

ranks, distance, and absolute zero point. Ex: Age (0, 1, 5, 10, 30
years old), Number of crimes committed (0 crime, 1 crime, 3 crimes),
Monthly income (None, P1, P100, P1,000, P10,000, P100,000).
57
These variables possess all the qualities of the three preceding

variables plus an absolute zero point. In terms of age, a 1 year old
child is different from a 5 year old child, the 5 year old child is older
than the 1 year old, the 5 year old child is 4 years older than the 1
year old, and they have a ratio: the 1 year old child is 5 years as
young as the 5 year old child (Ratio = 1:5).
Notice that these variables increase from variables with little
information (nominal) to the ones with the highest information (ratio). Take
for example how we can measure crime:
Nominal measure
committed)
Ratio measure = Number of crimes committed (none, 2 crimes, 3

crimes).
Commission
of
crime
(committed,
not
Notice again that in the nominal measure, commission of 2 or 3

crimes is collapsed into one measure committed. This measure means a
loss of information. In research, ratio level variables are preferable;
however, there are times when researchers resort to nominal measures.
(We will discuss about this in detail in our lessons in statistics).
We can summarize the differences between these four types of
variables using Table 5 below.
Table 5. Properties of the types of variables.
Comparison statements
A is equal to (not equal to) B
A is greater than (less than) B
A is three more than (less than) B
A is twice (half) as large as B
Nominal
Ordinal
Interval
Ratio
Adapted from Bachman & Schutt (2006).

Variables, research questions and hypothesis
We will appreciate variables more if we look back on research
questions, for example: Does low self-control influence individual-level
police misconduct? You might remember that that this was the central
research question of Donner and Jennings (2014: 205). Clearly, the
variables in their research question are self-control and police misconduct
(see Table 6). Police officers differ in terms of self-control levels and police
misconduct. Some have low self-control; some have high. Some have
committed more misconduct, while others fewer or none at all. They
wanted to know whether those with low self-control commit more or less
police misconduct. If so, they could say that low self-control influences
58
police deviant behavior. But what did they mean about self-control? How
about police misconduct? How could they measure self-control and police
misconduct? How would they find out if a police officer has high or low
level of self-control and police misconduct?
Table 6. An illustration of the relationship between a research problem,
question, hypothesis, and variables in explanatory research.
Problem
statement
The main objective of this study is to investigate whether a police

officers level of self-control is significantly related to his/her
involvement in police misconduct.
Research
question
Does low self-control influence individual-level police misconduct?
Hypothesis
Police officers with low self-control levels commit more police

misconduct than police officers with high self-control levels.
Independent variable
Dependent variable
Self-control
Police misconduct
Variables
In Table 6, we can see another typology of variables independent

and dependent variables. This is the case when we deal with relationships
between variables. One is the independent variables; the other is the
dependent variable. The independent variable is the variable that is
expected to affect the dependent variable, while the latter is the variable
that depend on or affected by the independent variable (Babbie, 2001;
Fraenkel & Wallen, 2006; Maxfield & Babbie, 2005). In other words, we
treat the independent variable as the cause, while dependent variable as
the effect. In our present example, we hypothesized that self-control level
is the cause, while police misconduct as the effect. In sum, in explanatory
research, we deal with cause and effect relationships.
How will I measure intangible variables in criminology?
At the outset of this lesson, we talked about the difference between
natural sciences (e.g. physics) and social sciences (e.g. criminology) in
terms of the measurement of their variables of interest. In natural
sciences, the objects of study (e.g. chemicals, speed, stones, and animals)
are tangible, measurable, and predictable; but in criminology, we might be
puzzled how to measure self-control, attitudes, job satisfaction, strain,
aggression, stress, which are not tangible we cannot observe them
directly. But this could not preclude scientific studies in criminology.
The good news is that criminologists have devised indices and scales
to measure their independent variables and dependent variables. This is
59
hinged on the assumption that anything that exist can be measured

directly or indirectly (Babbie, 2001). Directly, we can determine the sex
(and other directly observable variables) of a person by just looking at his
appearance or asking him to fill out a paper asking his sex. Indirectly, we
can measure intangible attitudes or traits by observing the behavior of the
person or asking him to fill out a set of questions or items that tap the
indicators of those attitudes or traits. For example, when you go to a party,
how would you know that a particular person is friendly? It is easy: just
observe him. If you see him hanging around a lot of friends, making jokes
around a lot of people, greeting a lot of people, not making trouble with
other people, and acts a host of other observable behaviors, you might say
that he/she is friendly. You do not really measure his/her being friendly
using a measuring stick or a weighing scale, but you just infer this
characteristics from his behaviors.
Another way of determining whether a person is friendly or not is by
letting him/her fill out a questionnaire with items tapping friendly
behaviors to which he/she would respond. If most of his/her responses
indicate being friendly, then you are safe to assume that he/she friendly
based on his/her answers.
There are variables that are easily measurable by asking a question,
for example age (How old are you?). In contrast, using one question or item
to measure an attitude or trait can cause bias to our measurements. For
example, it is a highly inaccurate measure when we ask only one question
to individual whether he frequently greets other persons or not, and
concludes that his one affirmative or negative answer makes him/her as
friendly or not. We need to choose several items that fully and accurately
represent a particular attitude. These items that tap the indicators of a
particular attitude or trait are chosen to devise an index or a scale.
Although sometimes they are used interchangeably, an index is
different from a scale (Babbie, 2001). An index is a composite measure of
a variable that simply assigns one point to each items in the index and
sum these points afterwards. If there are five items in an index, and the
respondent chooses the 4 items, the score of this respondent is 4. On the
other hand, a scale is a composite measure of a variable that places
different weights on the responses depending on their relative importance
in measuring a variable. For example, if there are five items in a scale, and
the respondent chooses the 2 items/responses that weigh 3 points each,
the score of this respondent is 6 points. None of these measures, however,
is superior to the other; it just depend on the characteristics of the variable
and its indicators.
Let us go back to our current variable of interest self-control. After
reading the literature, we can find that researchers use indices and scales
60
to measure this intangible variable. Table 7 and 8 show the two types of
measures used by previous researchers to measure self-control.
Measuring self-control using a scale
The most commonly used scale to measure self-control in
criminological studies is the scale created by Grasmick et al. (1993). They
used 24 items to measure self-control following Gottfredson and Hirschis
(1990) definition. These items were subdivided into 6 dimensions, and
each dimension was measured by four items (see Table 7). Their scale is
an example of a Likert scale (one of the most popular scaling techniques
in criminology). There are, however, other useful scaling techniques for the
social sciences. See Babbie (2001) for an excellent overview of these
techniques.
Table 7. Self-control attitudinal scale.
Self-control Attitudinal Scale
(Grasmick et al., 1993)
Dimensions
Impulsivity
Simple tasks
Risk seeking
Attitudinal Indicators
I dont devote much thought
and effort to preparing for the
future.
I often do whatever brings me
pleasure here and now, even
at the cost of some distant
goal.
Im more concerned about
what happens to me in the
short run than in the long
run.
I much prefer doing things
that pay off right away rather
than in the future.
I frequently try to avoid
things that I know will be
difficult.
When things get complicated,
I tend to quit or withdraw.
The things in life that are
easiest to do bring me the
most pleasure.
I dislike really hard tasks
that stretch my abilities to
the limit.
I like to test myself every now
and then by doing something
a little risky.
Strongly
agree
(4)
Agree
somewhat
(3)
Disagree
somewhat
(2)
Strongly
disagree
(1)
61
Physical
activities
Self-centered
Temper
Sometimes I will take a risk

just for the fun of it.
I sometimes find it exciting to
do things for which I might
get in trouble.
Excitement and adventure
are more important to me
than security.
If I had a choice, I would
almost always rather do
something physical than
something mental.
I almost always feel better
when I am on the move than
when I am sitting and
thinking.
I like to get out and do things
more than I like to read or
contemplate ideas.
I seem to have more energy
and a greater need for activity
than most other people my
age.
I try to look out for myself
first, even if it means making
things difficult for other
people.
Im not very sympathetic to
other people when they are
having problems.
If things I do upset people,
its their problem, not mine.
I will try to get the things I
want even when I know its
causing problems for other
people.
I lose my temper pretty
easily.
Often, when Im angry at
people I feel more like hurting
them than talking to them
about why I am angry.
When I am really angry, other
people better stay away from
me.
When I have a serious
disagreement with someone,
its usually hard for me to
talk about it without getting
upset.
62
Table 7 not only presents self-control indicators but also check ()

marks indicating the degree of agreement to each of the 24 items. Assume
that we ask a respondent to fill out this scale. When the respondent checks
Strongly agree response to the item, I lose my temper pretty easily, we
can say that he indicate that he loses his temper pretty easily. His score
for this item is 4, indicating low self-control. Note that in this scale, a high
score indicates low self-control.
To create the overall score for this respondent on this scale we can
perform different techniques, for example summative technique, use of zscores, or weighting the each item using their factor loadings in a factor
analysis. For ease of illustration, let us use the summative technique; the
other two are statistically complex, and space limitation restricts us to
perform these techniques. In the summative technique, you only need to
add all the scores. So, adding all the score in this example result to the
overall score of 83. Note that using this technique a respondents possible
score for this scale range from 24 to 96. If he/she checks all strongly
disagree (1) responses, his/her overall score is 24; if all strongly agree (4)
responses, 96.
Measuring self-control using an index
Let us now illustrate the use of an index to measure a variable. The
data Donner and Jennings (2014) used in their study did not allow them
to use the Grasmick self-control scale to measure self-control of police
officers. Instead, they used an alternative: self-control behavioral index.
Table 8. An example of self-control behavioral index.
Self-control Behavioral Index
(Donner & Jennings, 2014)
Indicators
Pennsylvania driver license ever been suspended
Ever involved in a motor vehicle accident
Received any traffic ticket in the past 5 years
Ever been dismissed or fired from a job
Ever behind on bills
Ever divorced or separated
Ever used marijuana
Ever received a D.I. (Deception Indicated) on a polygraph
examination
Ever received an unexcused absence from the police academy
No
(0)
Yes
(1)
63
Donner and Jennings (2014) used 9 items to construct their selfcontrol index. Note that these items are behavioral indicators. Thus, their
study implies that we can measure self-control by observing or asking the
police officers current and present behaviors. If they acted in one of the
nine items, that is an indicator of low self-control. This is similar to our
earlier example on measuring friendliness by observing behaviors.
Again, we will assume that a police officer has done some of the
items in the index as indicated in Table 8. He/she is scored 1 if he acted
one item; 9, if all items. Thus, the possible score for this index range from
0 to 9. With the current example, this hypothetical respondent scores 6 on
this index.
How can I measure crime?
We have already addressed how to measure intangible variables.
Now, we will learn how to measure crime the most important variable in
criminology and criminal justice. Over the years, criminologists have used
several techniques to measure crime and each has its own purpose and,
of course, weaknesses (Maxfield & Babbie, 2005; Sullivan & McGloin,
2014). In this subsection, we will focus on the ways to measure crime. At
the outset, the researcher must consider the following before choosing a
particular measure of crime (Maxfield & Babbie, 2001):
Purpose of the measurement
Consider whether your measurement is for monitoring crime levels,
agency accountability, or research.
Type of crime
You should decide what crime to include in you measure (Violent
crime or property crime? If property crimes, what property crimes,
robbery, theft, motor vehicle theft?)
Units of analysis
Finally, you should consider your unit of analysis (Persons,
organizations, groups, or social artifacts?)
Once you have considered all these three important preferences, you
can then decide how to measure crime. Perhaps, when you are asked how
many crime there are in your city/municipality, you would point your
citys police station as the source. But, this is not the sole source of
information on the number of crimes.
Crimes can be measure in several ways through reported crimes,
victimization surveys, and self-report surveys of offending (Maxfield &
64
Babbie, 2005). Each of these measures have its own limitations and
appropriate use.
Reported crimes
Reported crimes are often used when researchers study places as
units of analysis streets, neighborhoods, cities, provinces, and countries.
In the Philippines, the most commonly used information about the
frequency of crimes are reported crimes. These data come from two main
sources: citizen reports and police observations. They are collected and
stored by several law enforcement agencies in the country. But most of
these data can be found in the National Crime Reporting System (NCRS)
of the Philippine National Police (PNP). The NCRS is an incident-based
reporting system. That is, each record contains one incident that may have
one or more offender, victim, and crime or offense. Before using these data,
the analyst must first disaggregate the different crimes committed in one
incident.
One major limitation of this measure, however, is what
criminologists call as the dark figure. Dark figure pertains to citizens
unreported crimes or crimes on which the police failed to observe (Winslow
& Zhang, 2008). Citizens tend to ignore light felonies and offenses. Thus,
most of these crimes are not reported to the police. Also, police officers are
not omnipresent; thus, they failed to observe all crimes, especially those
highly clandestine crimes and offenses such as drug crimes. Another
limitation is the quality of the data recorded. There had been no strict and
clear protocols in the PNP on what incidents were to be recorded in the
NCRS. Moreover, the PNP itself discovered that some chiefs of police distort
their crime rates just to portray good image that less crimes occur in their
jurisdictions (Elona, 2013). Fortunately, as of the time of this writing, the
PNP is auditing and upgrading its NCRS in all police stations around the
country to improve the recording of crime incidents.
The strength of the PNP NCRS, however, lies in some reported
serious crimes, for example homicide and murder for crimes against
persons and motor vehicle theft for crimes against property. A homicide is
likely reported to the police because of its inherent seriousness. While,
citizens cannot afford to just keep quiet when their prized motor vehicles
are stolen.
Reported crimes are often used by the authorities to describe the
crime situation of the country and of other geographical units from
Philippine regions to barangays. They do this through crime rates. A crime
rate is a relative measure of crime risk per a geographic units total
population. It is computed using the following formula (Champion, 1993):
65
Crime rate =
Number of crimes
Population
100,000.
Suppose that Dumaguete City, with an approximate population of

125,000, is our geographical unit of interest, and you wish to compute is
homicide rate in 2014. In that year, there were 90 homicide offenses
recorded in the Dumaguete City PNP NCRS. The computation of its
homicide rate in 2014 is as follows:
Homicide rate =
90 Homicide cases
125,000
100,000
Homicide rate = 0.00072 100,000

Homicide rate = 72 Homicide cases per 100,000 population
Interpretation:
In 2014, there were 72 homicide cases per 100,000 persons. In other
words, approximately 72 persons per 100,000 population were at risk of
being killed through homicide.
Note that the figure, 100,000, is a constant. This means per
100,000 thousand population. You can, however, use other figures like
1,000, 10,000, or 1,000,000. The choice among these constant figures
depends on the frequency of the crime and the size of population. If the
crime is rare, like homicide in Dumaguete City, it is appropriate to use
100,000; if the number of homicide cases were large, we could use 1,000.
However, the figure, 100,000, is the most frequently used constant to
calculate crime rates. We use these constants in computing crimes rates
to reduce the bias associated with the number of population. For instance,
City A recorded 100 homicide; while City B, 130. You might then conclude
that A is more violent than B when not taking into account each citys
population which is: City A = 80,000 population and City B = 200,000
population. If you load these figures into our formula, this will be the crime
rates for each city: City A = 125 per 100,000 persons and City B = 65 per
100,000 persons. It turns out that City A is in fact more violent than B.
Despite its common use, crime rate suffers from several weaknesses
(Brantingham & Brantingham, 1997; Zhang & Peterson, 2007). For crimes
against property, the use of population as the denominator is biased
because not all have a particular property; the best denominator is the
total number of properties. However, determining the total number of
properties in a city seems impossible. Even in crimes against person, bias
still exist. Most calculation only include the total population derived from
the census of residents in a particular city. Thus, the measure exclude
foreigners, tourists, and other people who are not residents in that city.
66
We should add that not all criminals and victims reside in a particular city
where the crimes occur.
In view of these limitations, some researchers offer some alternatives
which they believe could overcome these biases. One alternative is crime
density that measures the relative risk of crime occurrence across space
by dividing the count of crimes by the size of the geographic unit where
these crimes occur (see Zhang & Peterson, 2007 for details). Another is the
location quotients of crimes which are relative measures of crimes that
show how a specific area varies from general trends (Brantingham &
Brantingham, 1997: 273).
Victimization surveys
We pointed out earlier that reported crimes undercount less serious
offenses that citizens are reluctant to report and those offenses that the
police fails to observe. Victimization surveys were devised to overcome
these limitations. These surveys take a sample of the population and ask
this sample of individuals their crime victimization experiences. With this,
policy makers are guided with a more comprehensive measure of crime.
Also, victimization surveys are often used when criminologists study
persons (victims) as units of analysis to test theories of victimization.
However, there are times when victimization experiences are aggregated to
larger units like cities and countries (see e.g., Van Dijk, Van Kesteren &
Smit, 2007).
In the Philippines, however, this is seldom done, and there is no
current national crime victimization survey in the country. Some of the
most popular large scale victimization surveys in other countries include
the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) in the US (Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005) and the International Crime Victimization Survey (ICVS) in
some industrialized countries in Europe, America, Asia, Australia, and
Africa (Van Dijk, Van Kesteren & Smit, 2007). These surveys were aimed
at monitoring victimization rates in several countries as an alternative to
crime rates. Aside from this, some researchers also conduct small-scale
surveys in cities and schools for monitoring and research purposes, for
example Mustaine and Tewksbury (1998) who surveyed some US college
students and found that victimization risk was related to the
characteristics of neighborhoods where they went and what they did there.
Victimization surveys are also limited in some aspects (Maxfield &
Babbie, 2005). Victims of consummated homicide and murder could not
be included in the survey. (Of course, they are already dead!). Likewise,
victimless crimes (e.g. drug crimes, prostitution, and gambling) could not
be captured by these surveys. You cannot ask a person if he has been a
victim of victimless crime, say, prostitution.
67
Sample of questions:
The following questions were taken from the ICVS 2004-2005
questionnaire (Van Dijk, Van Kesteren & Smit, 2007). This is an example
on how to ask respondents for their victimization experiences.
Q100. First of all, you mentioned the theft of a car. When did
this happen? Was this . . .
This year
Last year, in 2004
Before then
Dont know/cant remember
Q101. How often did it happen in 2004?
Once
Twice
Three times
Four times
Five times or more
Dont know
Self-report surveys of offending
To overcome the limitations associated with reported crimes and
victimization surveys, criminologists devised self-report surveys of
offending. These surveys ask a sample from a population to report their
past offending behaviors through filling out a questionnaire. This measure
is commonly used by criminologists who study persons (offenders) as units
of analysis. According to Maxfield and Babbie (2005:159), these surveys
are probably the best method for trying to measure certain crimes that
are poorly represented by other techniques. In addition, self-report survey
is most dominant method to collect data used by criminologists to explain
criminal behavior (OBrien, 1985, quoted by Maxfield & Babbie, 2005).
This is partly because most theories in crime explain variation of criminal
behaviors across persons as units of analysis.
Remember that reported crimes undercount less serious crimes and
police unobserved offenses. While, victimization surveys exclude victimless
crimes. Self-report survey is the method that could overcome these
limitations. However, the nature of this method raises some important
concerns (Maxfield & Babbie, 2005). It could be that offenders are
reluctant to report their past crimes or offenses because of social
desirability issues. Or, offenders may suffer from recall issues, especially
chronic offenders who have committed large number of offenses.
68
These issues seems apparent from the survey of the Dangerous

Drugs Board (DDB; 2008). The DDB conducted a national survey to
measure the extent of drug abuse in the Philippines in 2008. Surprisingly,
there were no respondent in Region I, IV-B, and XII who said that he/she
was a current drug user at the time of the survey. There are three possible
reasons for this: (a) there were really no current drug users in those
regions; (b) the research method was defective, thus, the surveyors did not
find respondents who were current users, and (c) the users did not tell the
truth for social desirability reasons. But, as it stands, there were
respondents who responded that they had tried using drugs 21
respondents in Region I, 46 in Region IV-B, and 21 in Region XII. It is quite
possible that some of these respondents were reluctant to report that they
were current drug users but just reported that they had tried using drugs
and had stopped.
Sample questions:
Asking respondents to report their past offending behaviors is
similar to asking them their past victimization experiences. The following
questions were taken from 2011 Global School-Based Student Health
Survey questionnaire.
Q26. During the past 12 months, how many times did you actually attempt
suicide?
0 times
1 time
2 or 3 times
4 or 5 times
6 or more times
Q29. During the past 30 days, on how many days did you smoke
cigarettes?
0 days
1 or 2 days
to 5 days
6 to 9 days
10 to 19 days
20 to 29 days
All 30 days
The relationship between units of analysis and the methods to
measure crimes is reflected in Table 9. Most previous studies selected a
method of measuring crime based on the units of analysis. And, each
method dictates what type of offenses are best measured by such method.
69
Note, however, that this suggestion still needs further research on the
validity and reliability of these measures.
Table 9. Suggested methods of measuring crime.
Units of analysis
Persons
(offenders, victims)
Offenses
Less serious, light

crimes
Measures of crime
Purpose
Based on
victimization
survey, self-report
survey of offending
Research,
monitoring
Groups
(streets, barangays, cities)
Serious offenses
(homicide, murder),
volume crimes (theft,
robbery)
Groups
(gangs)
Serious and
less serious
crimes
Based on reported crimes
Based on selfreport survey

of offending
Monitoring, research
Research
How do I construct my questionnaire?

Knowing how to measure your key variables is an important step in
the research process. At this time, we will combine what we have just
learned. (A curious reader is referred to Patten, 1998, for an excellent
practical guide for questionnaire construction).
Let us assume that we are to conduct a survey on adolescent
delinquency of college students, and we want to explain delinquency using
self-control theory of Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990). We do this by having
age, gender, and household monthly income as control variables. That is,
when we regress delinquency on self-control, we hold constant these three
variables. You should note that this is a basic and simple additive model
of explain delinquency. We can add other variables of interest in
criminology such as parental supervision, number of delinquent peers,
attachment and commitment to conventional people and activities. We can
also use some mediating and moderating variables. For now, we will settle
with this simple additive model:
Independent variables
Dependent variable
Age
Gender
Delinquency
Family
income
Self-control
70
The following is the sample questionnaire that we can use to test

our model to explain delinquency. In constructing your questionnaire, you
should bear I mind that important variables you will use in your study.
Then, construct questions that could measure these variables.
SAMPLE QUESTIONAIRE
Now, I would like to know some background information about you. To do this, I have arranged
the items below that require your response. There are two types of items: some require you to
place a check () mark and some require you to write in your response.
What is your . . .
1.
Age: __________________ (Write in your answer)
2.
Gender:
Male
3.
Female
Family or household monthly income:

Below P1,000
P1,001 P5,000
P5,001 P10,000
P10,001 P20,000
P20,001 P30,000
P30,001 P50,000
P50,001 or More
This time, I want you state your degree of agreement to each of the following items. Please
place a check mark () in the box that corresponds to your answer.
Items
4.
I dont devote much

thought and effort to
preparing for the future.
5.
I often do whatever
brings me pleasure here
and now, even at the cost
of some distant goal.
6.
Im more concerned
about what happens to
me in the short run than
in the long run.
7.
I much prefer doing

things that pay off right
away rather than in the
future.
Strongly
agree
Agree
somewhat
Disagree
somewhat
Strongly
disagree
71
8.
I frequently try to avoid

things that I know will be
difficult.
9.
When things get

complicated, I tend to
quit or withdraw.
10. The things in life that are

easiest to do bring me
the most pleasure.
11. I dislike really hard tasks
that stretch my abilities
to the limit.
12. I like to test myself every
now and then by doing
something a little risky.
13. Sometimes I will take a
risk just for the fun of it.
14. I sometimes find it
exciting to do things for
which I might get in
trouble.
15. Excitement and
adventure are more
important to me than
security.
16. If I had a choice, I would
almost always rather do
something physical than
something mental.
17. I almost always feel
better when I am on the
move than when I am
sitting and thinking.
18. I like to get out and do
things more than I like to
read or contemplate
ideas.
19. I seem to have more
energy and a greater
need for activity than
most other people my
age.
20. I try to look out for
myself first, even if it
means making things
difficult for other people.
21. Im not very sympathetic
to other people when
they are having
problems.
72
22. If things I do upset

people, its their problem,
not mine.
23. I will try to get the things
I want even when I know
its causing problems for
other people.
24. I lose my temper pretty
easily.
25. Often, when Im angry at
people I feel more like
hurting them than
talking to them about
why I am angry.
26. When I am really angry,
other people better stay
away from me.
27. When I have a serious
disagreement with
someone, its usually
hard for me to talk about
it without getting upset.
Finally, the following items below ask your past behaviors. Please place a check mark () on the
box that corresponds to how frequent you have committed in the PAST 12 MONTHS each of the
following items.
Never
HAVE YOU EVER . . .
One
time
2 to 3
times
4 to 6
times
More
than 6
times
28. Intentionally damaged or destroyed

property belonging to a school, college,
or university?
29. Written graffiti on a bus, on school
walls, on rest room walls, or anything
else in a public place?
30. Cheated on school tests (e.g., cheat
sheet, copy from neighbor, etc.)?
31. Intentionally missed classes over a
number of days for no reason, just
for fun (e.g., there was no family
emergency)?
32. Avoided paying for something (e.g.
movies, bus, food, etc.)?
33. Stolen, taken, or tried to take
something?
34. Hit of threatened to hit a person?
35. Used force or threatened to beat
someone up if they didnt give you
money or something else you wanted?
Note: Items on self-control are from Grasmick et al. (1993); the items on delinquency are
from Vazsonyi & Belliston (2007).
73
Summary
Unlike in the natural sciences, measurement of variables in
criminology and criminal justice is not straightforward, complex, and often
debated. Especially, these issues occur when criminologists measure
intangible attitudes and traits of persons and, of course, the most
important dependent variable in criminology crime. These issues,
however, can be mitigated by using indices and scales to measure
intangible variables and using each of the methods of measuring crime
according to when each of the methods best measure a particular offense.
It should be noted that none of the measures can completely measure
crime; it just depends on the purpose, type of offense, and units of analysis
in a particular research project. Finally, it is important to think of your
research problem, questions, and variables when constructing your
questionnaire; and attempt to construct the most valid and reliable
questions in measuring these variables.
74
LESSON 5 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Go to Google Scholar again and search for The Effect of Higher

Education on Police Behavior. Read the Method section and fill
out this table 9Use separate sheet if necessary:
Measure
Type of
Name of variable
measure
Dependent
1.
variable
2.
3.
1. Sex
Male = 1
Female = 0
Nominal
2.
3.
4.
5.
Independent
variables
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
75
References
Wadsworth
Bachman, R. & Schutt, R. (2006). Fundamentals of research in
criminology and criminal justice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications,
Inc.
Brantingham, P.L. & Brantingham, P.J. (1997). Mapping crime for
analytic purposes: Location quotients, counts, and rates. In D. Weisburd
& T. McEwen (Eds), Crime mapping and crime prevention. Monsey, NY:
Willow Tree Press, Inc.
d%20Survey.pdf
Grasmick, H., Tittle, C., Bursik, R. Jr., & Arneklev, B. (1993). Testing the
core empirical implications of Gottfredson and Hirschis general theory of
crime. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 30(1): 5-29.
Mustaine, E.E. & Tewksbury, R. (1998). Predicting risk of larceny theft
victimization: A routine activity analysis using refined lifestyle measures.
Criminology, 36(4): 829-857.
Sullivan, C. & McGloin, J.M. (2014). Looking back to move forward:
Some thoughts on measuring crime and delinquency over the past 50
years. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 51(4): 445-466.
76
Van Dijk, J., Van Kesteren, J. & Smit, P. (2007). Criminal victimization in
international perspective: Key findings from the 2004-2005 ICVS and EU
ICS. Wetenschappelijk Onderzoeken Documentatiecentrum.
Vazsonyi, A. & Belliston, L. (2007). The family, low self-control, deviance:
A cross-cultural and cross-national test of self-control theory. Criminal
Justice and Behavior, 34(4): 505-530.
Winslow, R. & Zhang, S. (2008). Criminology: A global perspective. Upper
Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.
77
LESSON 6
SURVEY SAMPLING
In the previous lesson, you learned how to measure the key variables
and construct questionnaire in your study. In this lesson, you will learn
how to systematically collect the data for a survey research. Specifically, I
will introduce you to survey sampling.
After this reading this lesson, you shall be able to:
differentiate probability and non-probability sampling;

develop your own sampling design;
and estimate the sufficient sample size.
Key terms
Census
Survey
Population
Sample
Probability sampling
Non-probability sampling
How can we describe a population?

Before we answer this question let us first tackle how we describe
an individual. For instance, you are to describe PO3 Juana dela Cruz. How
will you describe her? Perhaps you will say: PO3 dela Cruz weighs 50 kg;
she stands at approximately 150 cm tall; she has three children; she has
arrested an average of 6 suspects in the last three years; she has high selfcontrol; and she is against the imposition of death penalty to serious
offenders. My next question is: How do you know of these descriptions?
Perhaps, you have looked into her Personal Data Sheet, or interview her,
or let her answer a questionnaire. Describing one person, therefore, is
somewhat easy.
But, how about if you are to describe not one but all 130,000 police
officers, or all 100,000,000 million Filipinos in the country, or all 10,000
university students Negros Oriental in State University Main Campus I. If
you were the government of the Philippines (with hundreds of millions of
funds!) intended for the decennial census then it will not certainly bother
you. Unfortunately, we do not have the luxury the government has. The
good news, however, is that past researchers have devised and established
a method that can be used to describe a population by just collecting
information from a subset of that population. This method is called as
survey (see Figure 1).
78
Figure 1. The concept of sampling. (Note: P represents person. Thus, in this

figure, there are 25 persons composing the population; and we take only a
subset of this population, say, 5 persons in conducting a survey.)
A survey is a method of collecting data from a subset of a population
to describe such population. In the Philippines, we often hear from the
news the results of national surveys by the Social Weather Station (SWS),
Pulse Asia, and the National Statistics Office. Popular topics include trust
ratings of government officials, polls and exit polls surveys during
elections, and family related topics in the National Household Survey. But,
how can, for example, these agencies precisely describe the trust ratings
of government officials by just surveying about a thousand persons out of
the 100,000 people in the Philippines? They can do this by using
probability sampling techniques. But, before delving on this techniques,
let us first tackle how researchers calculate the sufficient sample sizes for
their surveys.
How to calculate the sample size?
This subsection introduces two common methods of determining the
sample size interval estimation and power analysis. Interval estimation
is usually used if one is interested to describe the population of interest
according to its characteristics like average age, number of family
numbers, percentage of the population who are in favor or against the
death penalty, average fear of crime, or percentage of the population that
have ever used dangerous drugs. In estimating the sufficient number of
units in a sample, the researcher specifies the number of population,
confidence level, and confidence interval. (We will delve on this concepts
later).
Another method in sample size determination which is currently
gaining much interest is the use of power analysis (Cohen, 1992). Power
analysis is usually used when one considers and attempts to avoid the
errors in hypothesis testing (i.e. Type I and Type II errors). To elaborate on
these errors, let us go back to our previous example of explaining youth
delinquency. Remember that we treated self-control, age, gender, and
79
family income as independent variables and delinquency as dependent

variable. We wished to determine the effects of these four independent
variables on the dependent variable. Type I error occurs if, for instance,
we have statistically found that self-control or the other variables have
affected delinquency when in fact they have not. On the other hand, Type
II error occurs if we have found that self-control or the other variables
have not affected delinquency when in fact they have. To avoid these errors
in hypothesis testing, we must consider some parameters such as
significance level, power of the hypothesis test, effect size, and number of
independent variables.
Sample Size Determination
The calculation of the sufficient sample size is somewhat
mathematically complex. The good news is: There are point-and-click
program and software that we can use to perform this calculation. We will
demonstrate how to use some of these programs in this subsection.
Interval estimation
For interval estimation, several programs are available online, for
example the Sample Size Calculator by Creative Research Systems (2015).
We will demonstrate how to use this program in the following tutorial.
Assume that you are to conduct a survey on police officers attitudes toward
some aspects of the administration and supervision of the Philippine
National Police by the National Police Commission. Specifically, you wish
to determine the percentage of the police officers in, say, Region VII
whether they are in favor or not of the deputation of local chief executives
(i.e. mayors and governors) to administer and supervise local police
stations. So, the result would be in terms of percentage (e.g. 40%, 50%,
60%, or 70% against or in favor). In short, we want to estimate the
percentage or proportion of police officers who are in in Region VII through
a survey of a sample of these officers. Suppose that there are 10,000 police
officers in the said region. Using the calculator to determine the sample
size out of 10,000 police officers is relatively easy. Here are the steps:
Step 1. Just type in your web browser (e.g. Google or Yahoo) sample size
calculator, and click the Sample Size Calculator. For quick access, you
can, however, visit this address:
http://www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm#two
You will then be directed to a web page containing the interface shown in
Figure 1.
80
Figure 1. The Creative Research Systems Sample Size Calculator

interface.
Step 2. The next thing you will do is to specify the parameters the
calculator needs the confidence level, confidence interval, and the
number of the total population. For example: Confidence level = 99%,
Confidence interval = 2, and Population = 10,000. Then, click Calculate.
You will then obtain the sample size needed as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Sample size calculation result.

For instance, after the randomized survey of 2,938 police officers you
obtained these results: 45% in favor and 55% against. You will then arrive
to the following interpretation.
Interpretation: We are 99% confident that our randomized survey of the
2,938 police officers captures the true percentage of officers who are in
favor or against the deputation of local chief executives to administer and
supervise local police stations. The true population proportion of police
officer who are pro-deputation is within plus or minus 2% from 45%. That
is, the true percentage of all 10,000 police officers who are in favor of the
deputation is from 43% to 47% based on the results of our survey.
Note: Confidence level means that if we repeat choosing 100 samples, 99%
of these samples contain the true percentage value of the population. Note
81
that you can also use other online sample calculator such as that of the
Australian National Statistical Service (2015).
Power Analysis
Another method to calculate the sufficient number of samples in a
research study is power analysis pioneered by Cohen (1992). Actually,
calculating the sample size is just one of the three uses of power analysis
in research projects a priori, post-hoc, and compromise power analysis
(see Mayr et al., 2007 for an introduction and tutorials). Of these three
power analyses, a priori analysis is the most ideal because it calculates the
sufficient sample size before any study is conducted, thereby controlling
the power of the hypothesis test that the researcher wishes to conduct
(Mayr et al., 2007). The power of the hypothesis test corresponds to the
number of units included in the sample. Note that too much sample units
leads to false rejection of the null hypothesis (Type I error); too less sample
units leads to false acceptance of the null hypothesis (Type II error). To
guard against these errors, the researcher can specify beforehand the
sufficient number of sample units through a priori power analysis. Here
we will demonstrate this analysis through the use of the power analysis
software GPower 3 (Faul et al., 2007). This software is freely available
online and can run on your laptop or personal computer.
Again, let us go back to our previous example with self-control, age,
gender, and family income as independent variables and delinquency as
dependent variable. Assume that we will use multiple regression analysis
to determine the effects of the four independent variables on delinquency.
To determine the sufficient sample size, we can follow these steps:
Step 1. Go to your web browser again and search for the download page
of GPower 3. Download the software and install it on your computer.
Step 2. After the installation, double click the GPower icon to run the
program.
Step 3. Once the GPower interface is displayed, you can now specify the
parameters needed for a priori analysis. Let the
Test Family = F test;

Statistical test = Linear Multiple Regression: Fixed model, R2
deviation from zero; and
Type of power analysis = A priori: OCmpute required sample
size given , power, and effect size.
82
Step 4. Now set the Input Parameters to the following and click
Calculate:
Effect size f
err prob
Power (1- err prob)
Number of predictors
=
=
=
=
0.15
0.05
0.95
4
Note: In multiple regression, the researcher can choose among three effect
sizes suggested by Cohen (1992) small (0.02), medium (0.15), and large
(0.35). This time, we will use medium effect size. The err prob represents
the error we wish to tolerate if our statistical test rejects the null
hypothesis. We set this to 0.05 error. If our statistical test indeed yields
exactly 0.05 error. We can say then that there is 5% chance that we did
not really find an effect of the independent variable (e.g. self-control) on
the dependent variable (delinquency). There reverse is: There is 95%
chance that the independent variable indeed affects the dependent
variable. Power represents the probability of finding an effect and thereby
rejecting the null hypothesis. Note that we cannot set this to perfect 1 (or
100% chance) or else we would suffer Type I error, nor we can set this
lower than 0.80 power or else we would suffer Type II error. Number of
predictors represents the number of independent variables which, in this
example, equals to 4.
The result (sample size = 129) of this analysis is shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Sample size calculatioin using GPower 3.1.9.2.

83
A note on sample sizes of qualitative studies

Note that the above sample size calculations are for quantitative
studies. For qualitative studies where the researcher has no luxury to
interview numerous samples, sample size determination is much governed
by rules of thumb. Some qualitative studies have these suggested sample
sizes: phenomenology = 5-25 respondents (Polkinghorne, 1989 cited in
Creswell, 2007) and grounded theory = 20-30 respondents (Creswell,
2007). Narrative research and case study of persons may have similar
number of respondents as with phenomenology or grounded theory, but
they may also have only one respondent. In the latter case, this single
respondent is both the population and the sample (Cohen, Manion &
Morrison, 2007).
After determining the sufficient sample size, you can then choose
the sample units from the population to which you wish to generalize your
findings. This is where the types of sampling can greatly ease your burden.
What are the types of sampling?
There are two types of sampling which you can use in selecting the
sample in your research project probability and non-probability sampling
(Babbie, 2001; Kothari, 2004; Maxfield & Babbie, 2005). Probability
sampling is a sampling design that gives equal probability or chance to
each item or individual in the population of being selected in the study.
On the other hand, non-probability sampling is a sampling design that
gives unequal chance to each item or individual in the population of being
selected in the study. Each of these types, however, have their own
strengths and weaknesses. Probability sampling is ideal when the
researcher wishes to generalize his findings to a population of interest.
Often, it is used for quantitative surveys. Whereas, non-probability
sampling is ideal when the researcher wishes to study in-depth a
particular phenomenon. Qualitative studies takes advantage of the ease of
using non-probability sampling.
What are probability sampling methods?
In probability sampling, all elements (or items or units) in the
population are afforded with equal probability of being selected for a study,
say, a survey. This method is important in order to generate a sample that
is representative of the population of interest. Going back to our previous
example of determining the perceptions of 10,000 police officers, we can
ensure that the perceptions of the sample of, say, only 800, 1000, or 2000
officers, approximate the perceptions of all the 10,000 police officers, if we
have generated a representative sample from the population. That is, the
characteristics of our sample approximate the characteristics of the
84
population. Because of several constraints in generating a representative

sample, there exist several methods in conducting probability sampling
such as simple random sampling, systematic sampling, stratified sampling,
multistage cluster sampling (Babbie, 2001; Kish, 1965). Note, however, that
these methods can be combined depending on the circumstances (Babbie,
2001). Note again that different sampling situations demand different
sampling methods.
Simple random sampling
From its name, simple random sampling is the simplest probability
sampling method. It is relatively easy. One only needs to have a
population frame, which is the complete list or at least the most complete
list of the desired population, say, police officers in Region, and a random
numbers table to facilitate the random selection of police officers to whom
a survey is conducted. We will illustrate this sampling method in the
following steps:
Step 1. Assume that we need to survey 800 police officers out of all 10,000
police officers in Region VII. If we use simple random sampling, we need
to have the (alphabetical and numbered) list of all police officers in the
region and a random numbers table. To acquire the list, you can ask the
PNP Region VII Headquarters. To acquire a random numbers table, you
can check research and statistics methods books or download from the
internet the RAND Corporations table of random numbers (RAND, 2001;
see Figure 4 for an excerpt of RANDs random numbers table).
Figure 4. An excerpt from RANDs (2001) random numbers table.
85
Step 2. We will randomize the selection of the first random number. Find
any Philippine paper money bill in your wallet. Mine is a PhP 20.00 bill
with serial number, AY680511. The first number in this serial number is
6. So we will start with the 6th column with the 1st random number of
54876 (see Figure 5). Remember that we need to choose 800 officers out
of 10,000. Since the total number of police officers is 10,000, we will use
all 5 digits of all numbers in the 6th column as reference. (Note that if the
total number of population is smaller than 10,000, say, 1,000, we will only
use the 1st four digits of 54876 which is 5487.) Going back to our example,
the first random number (i.e. 54876) meets our 5-digit criterion; however,
there is no 54876th respondent in our list of officers. There are only up to
10,000th officer, so we will skip this number and proceed to the one below
it which is 24,037. Still this number does not corresponds to any of our
respondent. The next number is 02560. Now, if we would go to our list of
police officers, we could find a 2,560th officer out of 10,000. So we pick this
officer as our first respondent. Finding another respondent follows the
same process until we arrive with a sample of 800 respondents. However,
if you reach the bottom of the random numbers table and you have not yet
completed the required 800 respondents, you can go back to the 8th
column corresponding to the 2nd number of the serial number (i.e.
AY680511) of our PhP 20.00 money bill, and follow the same selection
process.
Figure 5. Selecting the respondents using the random numbers table.

86
Systematic sampling
Systematic sampling is a popular alternative to simple random
sampling. It affords the ease and efficiency in selecting the elements of the
sample, and is sometimes called as pseudo-random selection (Kish,
1965: 113). It consists of these steps:
(1) conducting a random start, and
(2) selecting every kth element of the population after Step 1.
These steps also afford every element in the population to have an
equal probability of being selected for the study. One important tool in this
selection process is the sample interval (Babbie, 2001; Kish, 1965). The
selection interval is the distance of next element from the previously
selected element; and thus, determines what elements are chosen
systematically. We will illustrate the steps in systematic sampling below:
Step 1. Determine the total number of population elements. In this
example, we assume that we have a 10,000 total population of police
offices in Region VII.
Step 2. Determine the total number of sample elements. We will assume
that we need, for this example, 1,000 police officers.
Step 3. Find the selection interval by using 1,000 to divide 10,000, as
shown below:
Selection interval =
10,000
1,000
= 10.
As shown, our selection interval is 10. Thus, every 10th element of the
population will be selected.
Step 4. Create a random start among the first 10 police officers. To do
this, you can follow the process we used in our simple random sample
illustration. If we have randomly selected the 2nd column of the random
numbers table above, the number 05 (i.e. the 5th police officer in our
population frame) will be our first element in the sample.
Step 5. Select the next police officer by just adding 10 to 5 (see Figure 6).
The sum would be 15; thus, the 15th officer in our list will be the next
sample element. Do this process of addition until you have already selected
1,000 officers.
87
Figure 6. Systematic sampling selection with 5th element as the random

start.
As shown above, systematic sampling is somewhat simpler than the
simple random sample. However, systematic sampling is vulnerable to
systematic arranged of the population elements. For instance, when ones
selection interval is 10, the random start element is 1, and every 10th
element in the list of police officers is systematically assigned as a squad
leader, then the respondents of the survey would all be squad leaders
excluding other officers from other ranks. This then creates bias in your
survey results. Nevertheless, if the population elements are not
systematically arranged, systematic sampling is an ideal alternative to
simple random sample (Kish, 1965); and no evidence exists which of the
two is better (Babbie, 2001).
Stratified sampling
There are times when simple random sampling or systematic
sampling may not be enough to achieve representativeness of the sample,
especially when the population is naturally divided into subpopulations or
strata. For example, police officers in the Philippines are naturally
composed of different subpopulations in terms of ranks (i.e. Police Officer
level, Senior Police Officer level, Police Inspector level, Police
Superintendent level, Police Director level), gender (i.e. male or female),
work stations (i.e. municipal police station, city police station/office,
provincial police office, regional police office, national headquarters), to
name a few. To achieve variance between and homogeneity within strata,
the researcher can use stratified random sampling which follows the
following steps: (1) divide the population into strata, and (2) choose sample
elements from each stratum using either simple random sampling or
systematic sampling.
Note that the size of the sample elements in a stratum must be
relatively proportional to the size of the population of elements in that
88
stratum. For example, among all police officers in the Philippines, Senior
Police Officers constitute 30% of all officers; thus, in the sample, there
must also be 30% Senior Police Officers. We will illustrate a simple process
of arriving at a stratified sample in the following steps:
Step 1. Assume again that we want to conduct a survey of police officers
in Region VII with 10,000 police officers, comprising 7,000 Police Officers
(70%), 2,500 Senior Police Officers (25%), 450 Police Inspectors (4.5%),
and 50 Police Superintendents (0.5%). Then, we have arrived with a
desired sample of 1,000 officers.
Step 2. Let us make sure that the proportion of ranks of the1,000 sample
of police officers must be relatively proportionate to the proportion of ranks
of the population of 10,000 police officers in the region. To do this, we will
perform simple mathematics by multiplying 1,000 with the different
percentages of ranks in the populations. For instance, Senior Police
Officers comprise 25% of all 10,000 police officers; thus, we shall multiply
1,000 with 25% or 0.25, and derive 250 Senior Police Officers, as
illustrated below:
1,000
1,000
1,000
1,000
x
x
x
x
0.70 = 700 Police Officers

0.25 = 250 Senior Police Officers
0.045 = 45 Police Inspectors
0.005 = 5 Police Superintendents
Step 3. Perform either simple random sampling or systematic sampling to

choose, say, 250 Senior Police Officers from all 2,500 Senior Police Officers
in the region. For ease and simplicity, you may choose systematic
sampling. Just arrange the list of all police officers in the region by rank
so that, for example, the first in the list are all Police Officers (arranged
alphabetically or shuffled randomly), followed by Senior Police Officers and
so on. Then use the sample interval of 10 (10,000 1,000), and choose a
random start among the first 10 officers in the list by using the random
numbers table.
Multistage cluster sampling
What if there is no available list of the population elements, say, all
names of people living in a city, province, region, or country, what methods
exist to help the researcher? Or what if using simple random sampling,
systematic sampling, and stratified sampling methods are too expensive
and complicated for a researcher? To answer these concerns, researchers
devised a less accurate but a more flexible and efficient way of probability
sampling compared with other probability sampling we have discussed so
far. Researchers usually use multistage cluster sampling to arrive at a
representative sample of a population which have not been compiled in a
89
list, for example all residents in Dumaguete City (Babbie, 2001; Kish,
1965). Previous probability sampling methods we have discussed are
conducted in one-stage only (i.e. we only select sample units once). In
multistage cluster sampling, we select sample units twice, thrice, or more
at different stages or units of analysis.
Going back to our lessons on units of analysis, a researcher has the
freedom what unit of analysis he/she is to study, whether at the regions,
provinces,
municipalities/cities,
barangays,
barangay
puroks,
dwellings/houses, residents (see Figure 7). In multistage cluster sampling,
he/chooses sampling units at different stages. For example, if he/she
wishes to survey some attitudes of all residents in the Province of Negros
Oriental, he/she is to:
Step 1. Divide Negros Oriental into clusters, for example,
municipalities/cities. Use either of the probability sampling methods we
have discussed (whichever is most ideal) to select the cities/municipalities
to survey.
Step 3. Divide these cities/municipalities into clusters of barangays, and
use again either of the probability sampling methods we have discussed
(whichever is most ideal) to select what barangays to survey.
Step 4. Divide these barangays into barangay puroks (villages) and select
what villages to study.
Step 5. List the houses/dwellings in the selected puroks/villages, and use
simple random sampling or systematic sampling to select the dwellings.
Step 6. Upon the survey, randomly select the occupant of the
house/dwelling who is going to be the respondent of the study.
Philippines
Regions
Provinces
Municipalities/Cities
Barangays
Puroks
Dwellings/Houses
Residents
Figure 7. Units of analysis that could be used in multistage cluster sampling

of residents in a particular geographical unit.
90
What are nonprobability sampling methods?

There are times, however, that probability sampling methods are
inefficient in answering some research problems, especially research
problems of qualitative research methods we have discussed in Lesson 3.
In this subsection, we shall learn nonprobability sampling methods that
are used by qualitative researchers. These methods, however, do not afford
equal chance to all elements of the population of being selected in the
study. Thus, research results of studies using these methods cannot be
generalized to the population of interest. But, nevertheless, the results
provide more in-depth examination of the phenomenon studied compared
with quantitative studies that use probability sampling methods.
Nonprobability sampling methods include convenience sampling,
purposive sampling, snowball sampling, and quota sampling (Babbie, 2001;
Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2007).
Convenience sampling
In convenience sampling, the researcher selects respondents who
are nearest to him or available to him; and, thus, affords him with the ease
of selecting respondents but at the risk of not achieving representativeness
of the sample. Results from studies that use convenience sampling cannot
be generalized to the whole population of interest. One example is when
we wish to determine the perception of the students on a particular city
ordinance, but we only interview those students who are currently
available at the time of our survey, say, those who are present at the school
canteen. Another example is when we want to study the perceptions of
police officers to any policing topic and we only survey those officers who
are around when we arrive at the police station in the morning. The former
example exclude those students who are not in the canteen where we
conduct our interviews. The latter example excludes police officers who are
in the other shifts, for example, night shifts. Results of these studies are
biased and questionable if we attempt to generalize all students or all
police officers. Nevertheless, if our purpose is not to generalize but to
answer some qualitative research questions or to provide a pilot study then
convenience sampling may be the most efficient.
Purposive sampling
Often, some researchers select respondents based on their judgment
on the purpose of their study. They use purposive sampling when they
want to study those respondents who are the most knowledgeable or those
who have more experiences with a particular phenomenon of interest. For
example, researchers who want to determine the negative experiences of
battered wives may interview those wives listed in the police station as
victims of gendered violence. The results of this method, however, exclude
91
the experiences of battered wives who did not report their victimization to
the police station.
Snowball sampling
Sometimes, however, target respondents are hard to access using
the nonprobability sampling methods described above. This is especially
true when the phenomenon of interest is highly sensitive and secretive, for
example, drug abuse or drug pushing. Even though some drug users and
traffickers are incarcerated, research results based on information from
these respondents are limited since there are still those who are
unincarcerated who may have different answers to our research questions.
However, population frame of all current unincarcerated drug traffickers
or drug abusers is unavailable. But it is important for us to learn some
things about these individuals for theoretical and policy-making purposes.
One remedy to this problem is the use of snowball sampling. With
this sampling method, the researcher first approaches a known
respondent who has experienced the researchers phenomenon of interest,
say, drug trafficking. The researcher then builds rapport with this drug
trafficker and make him as the studys first informant. After collecting
information from this respondent, the researcher then asks him to point
out another drug trafficker he knows. The researcher then interviews this
second drug trafficker and asks him another drug trafficker to interview.
The process continues until the researcher arrives at his desired number
of respondents or no other trafficker is pointed out.
Quota sampling
This sampling method is considered as the nonprobability
samplings equivalent of probability samplings stratified sampling method
(Bailey, 1978 cited in Cohen, Manion & Morrison, 2007). The researcher
attempts to obtain samples representing the proportion of population
elements in strata. One major difference, however, between quota
sampling and stratified sampling is the method of sample selection. Quota
sampling does not use probability sampling method (e.g. simple random
sampling and systematic sampling) in selecting sample elements; instead
it uses convenience sampling or purposive sampling. Thus, to perform
quota sampling, just follow Step 1 and Step 2 of the steps (except Step 3)
in stratified sampling method illustrated above. Then, perform
convenience sampling or purposive sampling.
92
Summary
In this lesson, we have learned how to determine the desired sample
size and the sample selection process of quantitative and qualitative
research. Quantitative researchers can use at least two methods of sample
size calculation interval estimation and power analysis. While, qualitative
researchers (facing several constraints) can use rules of thumb in
determining sample sizes. Moreover, there are two types of sampling
methods probability and nonprobability sampling. The most commonly
used probability sampling methods are simple random sampling,
systematic sampling, stratified sampling, and multistage cluster sampling.
All of these methods attempt to obtain a representative sample from the
population. It should be noted that none of these methods is better than
the other; it just depends on the research problem and the design of the
study. On the other hand, nonprobability sampling methods include
convenience sampling, purposive sampling, snowball sampling, and quota
sampling. Although these methods do not result to representative samples,
they are best when the researcher plans to conduct qualitative research.
93
LESSON 6 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Using what you have learned from Interval estimation in sample size
determination, calculate the sample size needed for each of the
following items:
Confidence
level
1. 95%
2. 99%
3. 99%
4. 95%
5. 95%
Confidence
Interval
3
5
10
5
3
Population
Sample size
120,000
112,546
201,768
323,124
102,093
2. Find a real population frame, for example list of all police officers in
a station, list of all jail officers in a jail, list of all personnel in a
company, or list of students in a class. Generate a random sample
of 25% out of all persons listed in the population frame. Use RANDs
A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates. Download
it from RANDs site:
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1418.html
Submit your random population frame and random sample
generated.
References
Wadsworth
Cohen, J. (1992). A power primer. Psychological Bulletin, 112(1): 155-159.
Cohen, L., Manion, L. & Morrison, K. (2007). Research methods in
education. New York, NY: Routledge.
Creative Research Systems (2015). Sample Size Calculator. Retrieved on
January 22, 2015, from http://www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm#two
Creswell, J. (2007). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing
among five approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Lang, A.G., & Buchner, A. (2007). G*Power 3: A
flexible statistical power analysis program for the social, behavioral, and
biomedical sciences. Behavioral Research Methods, 39, 175-191.
Kish, L. (1965). Survey sampling. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Kothari, C.R. (2004). Research methodology: Methods and techniques.
Daryaganj, New Delhi: New Age International (P) Ltd., Publishers.
Mayr, S. Erdfelder, E., Buchner, A. & Faul, F. (2007). A short tutorial of
GPower. Tutorials in Quantitative Methods for Psychology, 3(2): 51-59.
National Statistical Service Australia. (2015). Sample Size Calculator
example using stratified random sampling. Retrieved on January 22,
2015, from
http://www.nss.gov.au/nss/home.NSF/pages/Sample+Size+Calculator+
Stratification+Examples?opendocument
RAND Corporation. (2001). A million random digits with 100,000 normal
deviates. Santa Monica, CA: RAND. Retrieved on June 3, 2013, from
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1418.html
95
LESSON 7
DATA ANALYSIS
After collecting the data you need to answer your research problem,
it is now time to summarize the data through statistical analysis. In this
lesson, you are expected to familiarize the use of some basic and advanced
statistical routines that you can use in summarizing complex data sets.
There is no need, however, to be a mathematician or an expert statistician
in order to apply statistical routines for research purposes. As Padua
(2000) posits, a student of research statistics do not need to conduct
algebraic calculation. One just needs to be familiar with the underlying
assumptions of a statistical technique and how to interpret the statistical
outputs or results. To make our statistical calculations easier and faster,
we shall take advantage of easy-to-use, point-and-click programs (i.e.
Minitab and Excel).
After reading this lesson, you shall be able to perform the following:
choose a statistical technique to solve a particular research question;

perform calculations of univariate, bivariate, and multivariate
statistics; and
interpret the results of univariate, bivariate, and multivariate statistics.
Key terms
Univariate statistics
Bivariate statistics
Multivariate statistics
Statistical software
Numerous statistical programs (both free and proprietary) are
available that could make our calculations easier and faster. Of these
programs, the most easy-to-use are point-and-click programs that works
like Microsoft Word and Excel include SPSS, Minitab, and some free
software which are available for download from the internet, for example
the program Tanagra. Perhaps, the most popular statistical software in the
social and behavioral sciences is the SPSS. However, there are some
programs that are less complex for a beginner like you.
In this lesson, we shall only use Minitab 13 and Microsoft Excel in
performing statistical calculations. Figure 8 shows the screenshot of
Minitab 13; Figure 9, Excel.
96
Figure 8. Minitab 13 main interface.
Figure 9. Excel 2013 main interface.
As you have noticed, there are data in these programs as shown by

the screenshots. These data were collected by:
Wechsler, H. (2001). Harvard School of Public Health College
Alcohol Study. ICPSR04291-v2. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university
Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2008-0205. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR04291.v2
97
These data contain information on US college students drinking

behaviors and other personal and situational information given by the
respondents of the survey. We will use these data in our succeeding
tutorials in data analysis.
Important:
Please ask the ETEEAP staff for a file folder, Data Analysis Tutorials,
where you can find the data. The staff will also give you the copy of the
Minitab software.
Data analysis tutorial 1: Opening a data file in Minitab
Step 1: Double-click on the folder MTBWIN; scroll down and find for this
icon,
, and double-click on it.
Step 2: Once Minitab is already opened, go to

for your
click
and
. Look
and double-click it. Once opened, doubleto open the file.
In our tutorials, we will routinely use Stat and Graph buttons in the
Menu. Just hover your cursor on Stat or Graph and these routines will
appear:
98
Data analysis tutorials

In our tutorials, we will attempt to determine the predictors of binge
drinking among US college students. That is, our dependent variable is
binge drinking and some independent variables like sex, attitudes towards
parties, and others. The figure below shows the coding of the variables in
our succeeding analyses.
Coding of the variables
A. Univariate analysis
Use the table below as your guide in conducting univariate analysis.
For example, if your variable is at the ratio level, use mean as a measure
of central tendency and standard deviation as spread. You can graph the
data using histogram or bar graph.
99
Percentage
Data analysis tutorial 2 : Calculating the percentage of male and female
students in the sample.
Step 1: Click Stat > Tables > Tally . . .
Step 2: Follow the steps in the Figure below
Now produce a pie graph for male and females by following these
steps:
Step 1: Click Graph > Pie Chart
Step 2: Follow the steps in the figure below.
100
Median and Interquartile range (IQR)

Data analysis tutorial 2: Calculating median and interquartile range of
year level. Median is the middle most point of the data. Thus, 50% of the
data are above it, while the other 50% is below it. Interquartile range is
just the measure of the middle 50% of the data.
Step 1: Click Stat > Basic Statistics > Display Descriptive
Statistics
Step 2: On the Display Descriptive Statistics dialog box, click C4
Class > Select > OK.
The results are shown in the Minitab Results View that shows the
statistics below of which Median is equal to three (3). You can calculate
the IQR using this formula: IQR = Q3 Q1. Thus,
IQR = 4-2
IQR = 2.
101
Mean and standard deviation (SD)

Data analysis tutorial 4: Calculating mean and its standard deviation.
Mean is commonly called average. The calculation is just simply adding
all numbers then divide it by the total number. Standard deviation is the
measure of how most of the numbers are spread from the average. For
example, if the mean age is 10 years old and the standard deviation is 2,
then we can say that most of the students age from 8 to 12 years old in
the data.
Step 1: Follow Steps 1 & 2 of Tutorial 2.
The results view shows that the mean is 21.162 and the standard
deviation is 2.04.
You can graph age though histogram. Follow these steps:

Step 1: Click Graph > Histogram.
Step 2. On the Histogram dialog box, click C2 Age in the variable
view > click Select > OK.
102
B. Bivariate analysis
In the preceding subsection, we learned how to conduct univariate
analysis. Now, we will learn how to analyze two variables at a time. This
type of analysis is important, especially when we wish to find a relationship
between variables. But before jumping on the tutorials, we will first learn
the types of relationships among variables.
The figure below shows a graphical representation of the types of
relationship among continuous variables.
The next figure shows the relationship between a categorical variable

and a continuous variable.
103
In conducting bivariate analysis, use the figure below as your guide.

For example, if you want to determine the relationship between two ration
variables, use Pearson correlation.
Bivariate analysis matrix
A note on significance level

In statistics, we only use a sample and from which we generalize the
results to the whole population from where we derive our sample. In effect,
the results are expected to not 100% representative of the population. For
example, in the population, the mean age of college students is 19.964
years old. However, with a sample, it is rare that we get the same mean
and instead get an estimate, say, 18 years old. Thus, in statistics there is
some error.
104
In examining relationships among variables, we term this error as

probability level or significance level. The significance level tells us the
probability of being wrong when we say that there is a relationship between
variables. In social science, including criminology, the commonly accepted
significance level is 0.05. Thus,
However, there is no scientific basis for choosing this

In fact Ronald Fischer, did not give a specific p-value (Field, 2013);
he recommended that it depend on the research context (see also
Labovitz, 1968)
1. The t-test
Data analysis tutorial 5: Calculating the difference between two means.
For example, we want to determine who between male and female US
students engage more frequently in binge drinking.
The research questions can be phrased as:
What is the difference between male and female students in terms
of engagement in binge drinking? Or
Is there a significant difference between male and female students
in terms of engagement in binge drinking?
Step 1: Stat > Basic statistics > 2-Sample t . . .

Step 2: Input gender to Subscripts; drinks4 to Samples
105
Note:
Before interpreting the results, remember first the coding of the
variables. You should note that Males were coded as 1 and Females were
coded as 2. From the results, we can see that Male students have a mean
binge drinking of 1.54 compared to 1.347 of the female students,
suggesting that male students have higher binge drinking levels than
females. However, does this difference occur beyond chance? That is, is
the error (P-value or significance level) associated with this difference
below 0.05? Now, look at the Red Box # 2 which shows that the p-value is
less than 0.05 because it is 0.000. Thus, the difference is significant
beyond chance. This finding is corroborated by the 95% Confidence
Interval (CI) for the difference between the two means (0.0978, 0.2899),
which does not cross zero and negative values (see Red Box # 3). Thus, the
difference is not likely to be zero or negative. Here is the interpretation of
the results:
Interpretation:
Table x shows that male students have higher binge drinking levels than female
students. As seen, the difference between the binge drinking mean levels between
the two groups is 0.1939, which is significant at the 0.0001 level. This is confirmed
by the 95% CI of the difference (0.0978-0.2899) which does not cross zero. Thus,
male students are more likely than females to engage in binge drinking.
106
2. The Analysis of Variance (ANOVA)

Data analysis tutorial 6. Calculating the difference of means among at
least three groups. With t-test, we tested the difference between two
groups. Now, what if we want to test the differences among, say, three or
four groups? This time we will use Analysis of Variance or ANOVA (an
extension of t-test) to do such comparisons. We will use it to determine
whether different year levels have different binge drinking levels. That is,
who have higher binge drinking levels, 1st year US students, 2nd year, 3rd
year, or 4th year? The research question can be phrased as follows:
What is the difference among college year levels in terms of
engagement in binge drinking?
Is there significant differences among year levels in terms of
engagement in binge drinking?
In Minitab, follow these steps:

Step 1: Stat > ANOVA > One-way
Step 2: Input drinks4 to Response; class to Factor
107
Again review the coding of the variables before interpreting the

results. Now set your eyes on the Red Box # 1, which contains the mean
binge drinking levels of the five groups (1st -5th year level). The means seem
to differ. But do these differences occur beyond chance? It is highly likely
that these differences are just product of chance as Red Box # 2 shows the
p-value of the differences is 0.385 which is far higher than 0.05. Thus,
these results can be interpreted as follows:
Year level of a student does not affect binge drinking (Table XX). Results of
the ANOVA reveal that the five groups of students according to year level do
not statistically differ in terms of their binge drinking means (F = 1.04, p =
0.385). Thus, all year levels have similar binge drinking levels.
3. Chi-square
Data analysis tutorial 7. Determining the association between two
nominal variables. In t-test and ANOVA, we measured the relationship
between a nominal variable (e.g. sex) and a continuous one (i.e. binge
drinking means). This time we will examine whether two nominal variables
are associated. Specifically, we will determine the relationship between sex
(Male/Female) and membership in fraternities/sororities (Member/Not
member). That is, who between male students and female student have
higher proportion of membership in fraternities/sororities?
What is the association
fraternities/sororities?
between
sex
and
membership
in
Is there an association
fraternities/sororities?
between
sex
and
membership
in
108
Follow these steps to execute the chi-square routine in Minitab.

Step 1: Stat > Tables > Cross-tabulation
Step 2: Input gender and fratsor into Classification variables
Step 3: Check Counts and Chi-square analysis > OK
Interpretation:
Table xxx shows no sex differences in membership to fraternities and
2
sororities, X (1, N = 1390) = 0.046, p = 0.830). That is, male and female
students have the same proportion in terms of fratsor membership.
4. Pearson correlation
Data analysis tutorial 8. Calculating the relationship between two
continuous variables. What if we want to determine the relationship
between two continuous variables? We cannot use the preceding bivariate
statistics. We will use instead Pearson correlation which calculates the
extent and direction of the relationship between two continuous variables.
Here is the research question we will attempt to answer this time.
What is the relationship between favorable attitudes toward parties
and engagement in binge drinking?
Is there a significant relationship between favorable attitudes toward
parties and engagement in binge drinking?
109
In Minitab, try these steps:

Step 1: Click Stat > Basic Statistics > Correlation
Step 2: In the Correlation dialog box, choose the variables that you want
to correlate. In this case, choose age, gender, fratsor, athletic, religion,
parties, and drinks4. (The coding of all these variables are in Binge
Coding word file.) Click OK.
Note that we include other variables aside from attitudes toward

parties and binge drinking. This is also to determine other bivariate
relationships between other variables. The correlation matrix is shown in
the figure below.
110
If you review the coding of the variables, higher values of attitudes

toward parties correspond to unfavorable attitudes toward parties; those,
if a student has higher values for attitudes toward parties, he does not like
parties. Now, let us look at the correlation matrix. You notice that there
are a lot of values in pair which represent the cells where two variables
intersect. For example, parties and drinks4 intersect at the last sect at the
bottom right corner. The cells have -0.319 and 0.000 values. The values
inside the red box is the correlation coefficient, while the one in the blue
box is the p-value or significance level. Right now, we are more concerned
with the sign of the correlation coefficient which correspond to the
direction of the relationship. Since the sign is negative (-0.319), it means
that the relationship between attitude toward parties and binge drinking
is negative. That is, when the values of attitude toward parties increase,
the values of binge drinking decrease. But since higher values of attitudes
toward parties indicate unfavorable attitudes toward parties, we can say
that those students who have unfavorable attitudes toward parties are less
likely to engage in binge drinking.
Interpretation:
Table XY shows a positive bivariate relationship between parties and drinks4 (r = 0.319, p = 0.0001) . Students who love parties tend to engage more in binge drinking.
111
You might notice that we included in the correlation analysis

variables that are of nominal measurement, for example sex. You learned
from t-test that when determining the relationship between a nominal and
a ration variable, we use t-test; and if we want to determine the
relationship between two nominal variables we use chi-square. Thus, it
seems wrong why we included nominal variables in Pearson correlation.
But as you go to multiple linear regression (an extension of Pearson
correlation), you will learn why we can do this.
Some caveats of Pearson correlation and other bivariate analysis
Before we rush into conclusion using bivariate analysis results we
should first be reminded of the following.
Bivariate relationships (does not imply causation!
(Solution: Experiment)
The significant relationships might be spurious because a
confounding variable might be lurking out there
(Solution: Multivariate analysis that controls other potentially
confounding variables, e.g. socio-demographic characteristics)
C. Multivariate analysis
As I pointed out above, you might wonder why we include nominal
variables in Pearson correlation analysis. Now, before we embark on our
journey in multivariate analysis, for example multiple linear regression,
we should first learn why we can include nominal variables in Pearson
correlation and in multiple linear regression as independent variables.
The use of feasibility of using nominal variables as predictors in
linear regression is hinged on the principles of the general linear model
which suggests that t-test, ANOVA, and LR are the same and yield identical
results.
Some myths in statistics
The idea that researchers cannot use dummy-coded independent
variables in MLR might originate from another myth on the perceived
different systems of t-test, ANOVA, and MLR. And this perceived difference
stemmed from the bifurcation of two disciplines in psychology
correlational and experimental (Cronbach, 1957; Cohen, 1968).
Correlational psychology (and biology) started from the works of Galton,
Pearson, and Yule. On the other hand, experimental psychology originated
112
from agricultural experimentation pioneered by Fisher. These two camps

had conflicting methodologies (including statistics used) and even
personal rift and rivalry for a host of reasons (both statistical and
personal), especially between Fisher and Pearson/Neyman (Field, 2013).
The camp of Pearson was into the use of correlation and MLR, while the
camp of Fisher was accustomed to ANOVA for differentiating groups in
experiments. That is probably why some books treat t-test, ANOVA, and
MLR differently; thus, placing each of these methods in separate chapters
without referring to the general linear model that could connect these
related statistical systems.
The linear model
As pointed out, the general linear model suggests that t-test,
ANOVA, and LR are the same statistical systems (Cohen, 1968; Kuiper &
Sklar, 2013), which boil down to the following equation (Field, 2013:44):
outcomei = (model) + error
This model means that we can predict observe values (e.g. rates of
delinquency) using the model estimates and the error. With the general
linear model as our reference, we can find that the models for the mean,
t-test, ANOVA, and LR/MLR are similar and takes the linear form. To
reduce complexity, we can denote model with b. The following table
shows that statistical models for the mean, LR, MLR, and t-test are just
elaborations of the general linear model (see Field, 2013 for an in-depth
discussion).
Statistics
Model
Example
Mean
outcome = (b) + error
Mean delinquency rates in the population =

mean in the sample + error (deviance)
Linear
Regression
outcome = (b0 + b1X) + error
Multiple
linear
regression
outcomei = (b0 + b1X1 + bX2) +

error
Mean delinquency rates in the population =

constant + coefficient(self-control) + error
(residual)
Mean delinquency rate in the population =
constant + coefficient (self-control) + coefficient
(sex) + error (residual)
t-test
The t-test is normally calculated

using this formula or its other
forms:
1 X
2
X
=
error
However, t-test
can be
expressed in the linear form:
If we want to determine gender differences in

delinquency, we can use this formula:
Mean delinquency rate (for a particular group)
in the population = (b0 + b1Sex) + error
Before doing this, we can code sex into Male = 0
and Female = 1, with Male as the base category.
113
where,
X = the group (coded as 0 or 1)
b0 = mean of the base category
group (0)
ANOVA
b1 = difference between group

means
ANOVA can also be expressed in
the linear form:
outcome = (b0 + b2X1 + b3X2) +
error
where,
X1 = Group 2
This coding scheme is guided by Cohen (1968),

Cohen et al. (2013), Field (2013) and Weinberg
& Abramowitz (2008).
We can predict differences in delinquency
among different, say, religious groups (Catholic,
Islam, Protestant) using the following formulas.
We can designate being a Catholic as the base
category (0) and then dummy-code other groups
(Islam member = 1, Not Islam member =0 and
Protestant = 1, Not Protestant = 0).
Mean delinquency rate of Catholics = b0 + (b2 X
0) + (b3 X 0)
X2 = Group 3
b0 = mean of the base category
(Group 1)
b2 = difference between the
means of the base category and
Group 1
b3 = difference between the
means of the base category and
Group 2
Mean delinquency rate of Islam members = b0 +

(b2 X 1) + (b3 X 0)
Mean delinquency rate of Protestants = b0 + (b2
X 0) + (b3 X 1)
This coding scheme is guided by Cohen (1968),

Cohen et al. (2013), Field (2013) and Weinberg
& Abramowitz (2008).
Thus, we can test group mean differences using LR/MLR with

dummy-coded variable/s as predictors. However, it is worth noting that
there is a slight difference between MLR using continuous predictors and
MLR using binary predictors. We shall see these difference in the next
subsection.
How LR behaves when using continuous and dummy-coded variables
We will use a hypothetical data set to detect the difference between
LR that uses continuous predictors and LR that uses dummy-code ones.
The data set is shown below. It shows the sex, levels of self-control, and
delinquent acts among 10 adult respondents.
114
Selfcontrol
Respondent
Jose
Wally
Paolo
Jimmy
Alan K.
Alden
Yaya Dub
Lola Nidora
Lola Tinidora
Lola Tidora
Male = 0; Female = 1
1.5
2.1
2.2
3
3.5
3.8
4.4
4.7
4.9
5
Delinquency Sex
20
18
17
15
12
9
6
5
3
2
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
1
1
1
With continuous variable as predictor

Lets start learning how a continuous variable predicts another
continuous variable. Lets treat self-control and delinquency as
continuous variables with the latter as the dependent variable and the
former the independent variable. In this case, we determine whether the
expected value of the dependent variable differs in a systematic way for
given values of the independent variable (Hardy, 1993:19). Thus, each
value of self-control (e.g. 3) predicts a mean value of delinquency (e.g. 15;
see Figure below). And if values of self-control and delinquency were
infinite, the regression line shown in the figure below would extend
infinitely.
115
With dummy-coded variable as predictor

Now lets see how linear regression models the effect of a binary
predictor (e.g. Sex) on a continuous dependent variables (e.g.
Delinquency). In this case, our independent variable can only take two
values (Male=0 or Female=1), which means that we will be predicting two
mean values only (Mean for Male Group and Mean for Female Group; see
figure below). As such,
In modeling a continuous dependent variables as a function
of a single dummy variable (Dji) we cannot claim to produce a
regression line. Instead, we produce an expected (or predicted)
value of Yi for each of these two possible values: the predicted
value of Yi when Dji = 1 and the predicted value of Yi when Dji
= 0. These predicted values correspond to conditional means:
the mean of Yi for subgroup j. (Hardy, 1993:19)
Thus, LR using dummy predictors approximates t-test. It
deals with predicting means of two groups. We will see this clearly
in the next subsection.
LR and t-test as identical models: An example

We have already seen how LR behaves when using dummy-coded
independent variables it predicts the means of two groups. At this time,
we will demonstrate that LR and t-test in fact yield identical results using
the data set above.
116
A t-test
relationship
approach
to
examining
the
sex-delinquency
Lets first examine the relationship between sex and delinquency

using descriptive statistics, box plots, and t-test results (see figure and
table below).
Descriptive Statistics: Delinquency by Sex
Variable
Delinque
Sex
0
1
N
6
4
Mean
15.17
4.000
Median
16.00
4.000
TrMean
15.17
4.000
StDev
4.07
1.826
Variable
Delinque
Sex
0
1
SE Mean
1.66
0.913
Minimum
9.00
2.000
Maximum
20.00
6.000
Q1
11.25
2.250
Q3
18.50
5.750
Two-Sample T-Test and CI: Delinquency, Sex

Two-sample T for Delinquency
Sex
0
1
N
6
4
Mean
15.17
4.00
StDev
4.07
1.83
SE Mean
1.7
0.91
Difference = mu (0) - mu (1)

Estimate for difference: 11.17
95% CI for difference: (6.68, 15.65)
T-Test of difference = 0 (vs not =): T-Value = 5.89
P-Value = 0.001
DF = 7
By looking the t-test results, we can say that gender differences in

delinquency exist. Male adults commit more delinquent acts compared
with female adults. However, we will arrive with the same results when
using LR.
117
An LR approach to examining the sex-delinquency relationship

Now, we will demonstrate how LR can compare group means using
the outputs of the t-test exercise, specifically the means of the groups. Note
that the mean delinquency for male group is 15.17 and 4 for the female
group.
Recall that t-test can be expressed into the following linear form:
where,
X = the group (coded as 0 or 1)
b0 = mean of the base category group (0)
b1 = difference between group means
First, we will show that b0 is the mean delinquency of the male group
(0) using this formula. Thus, if we ignore the error,
Male delinquency mean = b0 + (b1 x 0)
Male delinquency mean = b0 + 0
b0 = 15.17 (mean delinquency of the male group)
Next, we will show that b1 is the difference between the means of
male and female groups. Thus, if we ignore the error,
Female delinquency mean = b0 + (b1 x 1)
Female delinquency mean = b0 + b1
Female delinquency mean = + b1
b1 = mean delinquency of the female group mean delinquency of the male
group
b1 = 4 15.17
b1 = -11.17
118
We will confirm this illustration with the actual results of the LR

predicting delinquency using sex (Male = 0; Female =1).
Regression Analysis: Delinquency versus Sex
The regression equation is
Delinquency = 15.2 - 11.2 Sex
Predictor
Constant
Sex
Coef
15.167
-11.167
S = 3.406
SE Coef
1.391
2.199
R-Sq = 76.3%
T
10.91
-5.08
P
0.000
0.001
R-Sq(adj) = 73.4%
Analysis of Variance
Source
Regression
Residual Error
Total
DF
1
8
9
SS
299.27
92.83
392.10
MS
299.27
11.60
F
25.79
P
0.001
The results of the LR confirm the earlier analysis. Notice that the
Coefficient for the Constant is 15.167, which corresponds to the mean
delinquency of the male group, and the coefficient for Sex is -11.167, which
corresponds to the difference between the means of female and male group
delinquency. The results further suggest that this difference is significant
at the 0.001 level.
Therefore, we can compare the means of female delinquency and male
delinquency using LR. The t-test and LR are identical.
When is LR more preferable than t-test?
Although, t-test and LR have identical results, there are times when
LR is more preferable, especially when ruling out confounding factors or
testing theories that require the input of multiple variables (both
continuous and binary) as predictors in the MLR model.
For example, Gottfredson and Hirschi (1990) suggest that selfcontrol and opportunity can account for variation of delinquency. They
further suggest that self-control and opportunity can rule out or decrease
the effects of other factors (e.g. sex) on delinquency when these factors are
simultaneously entered into the model to predict delinquency. Lagrange
and Silverman (1999) examined these propositions and argued that sex
differences in offending can be accounted for by self-control and
119
opportunity. Males had been known to have higher offending rates that
females. However, based on Gottfredson & Hirschis (1990) work, they
argued that this relationship would diminish or at least attenuate once
self-control and opportunity were statistically controlled. Indeed, their
analysis supported their claims. When men and women had the same level
of self-control and opportunity to commit delinquency, the effects of sex
on drug use diminished and its effects on other delinquent acts were
attenuated.
We can approximate what Lagrange and Silverman (1999) did by
analyzing our current hypothetical data set. Let gender and self-control be
the independent variables and delinquency as dependent variable. The
result of the MLR are, as follows:
Regression Analysis: Delinquency versus Self-control, Sex
The regression equation is
Delinquency = 27.4 - 4.57 Self-control - 1.72 Sex
Predictor
Constant
Self-con
Sex
Coef
27.428
-4.5693
-1.724
S = 0.8602
SE Coef
1.180
0.4198
1.030
R-Sq = 98.7%
T
23.24
-10.88
-1.67
P
0.000
0.000
0.138
R-Sq(adj) = 98.3%
Analysis of Variance
Source
Regression
Residual Error
Total
Source
Self-con
Sex
DF
1
1
DF
2
7
9
SS
386.92
5.18
392.10
MS
193.46
0.74
F
261.46
P
0.000
Seq SS
384.85
2.07
In our previous analysis, gender significantly predicted delinquency

(b = -11.167, p<0.001). That is, men have higher rates of delinquency
compared to women. However, this effect disappeared once we statistically
controlled self-control. The effect of sex on delinquency became
nonsignificant in the MLR.
In sum, we can use dummy-coded predictors in MLR, and this is
important for research questions that require multivariate analysis.
120
5. Multiple linear regression

Data analysis tutorial 9. Determining whether a group of independent
variables (nominal/interval/ratio) predict or explain a dependent variable
(ratio/interval). Here is the research question we will attempt to answer
using multiple linear regression:
Can binge drinking be significantly predicted using age, gender,
membership in frat/sor, and attitudes toward athletics, religion, and
parties?
Follow these in Minitab:

Predict or explain drinks4 using age, gender, fratsor, athletic, religion,
and parties using multiple linear regression.
Step 1: Click Stat > Regression > Regression
Step 2: Select drinks4 as your Response and age, gender, fratsor,
athletic, religion, and parties as Predictors > OK
121
Again, before interpreting the results review the coding of the

variables. Now, let us learn what to look at the results of the multiple linear
regression. You notice in the figure above that there are three major parts
of the regression results (1) regression equation, (2) regression table, (3)
analysis of variance. The regression equation serves as the formula we
could use in predicting binge drinking levels of a US student. The
regression table shows five columns which contain the predictors,
coefficients of the relationship between the predictor and binge drinking,
standard error of the coefficient, the t-value associated with the test of
hypothesis, and the p-value or significance level of the relationship
(coefficient). The analysis of variance shows whether the full model
composed of the predictors significantly predicts binge drinking or not.
For now, we should be more concerned with the last two major part
of the results the regression table and the analysis of variance. Let us
look at the analysis of variance first whether the full model of predictors
predict our dependent variable. In particular, look at the p-value enclosed
in a red star. The p-value (p=0.000) is well below 0.05; thus, the full model
is able to predict binge drinking among US students.
But the question is, do all of the predictors significantly predict
binge drinking? We should now look at the regression table which shows
the relationship of each predictor (independent variable) and binge
drinking. The first column that we should look is the last column, the pvalue. Let us look for p-value/s that is lower than 0.05. As we can see,
only four predictors have p-values lower than 0.05. These predictors are
the constant, sex, religion, and parties. You might wonder where constant
does come from since it is not included in our analysis. Constant is the
point in the y-axis when the values of the predictors are equal to zero. In
122
this analysis, the constant is not important, so we can disregard it. Let us
focus on the other three predictors sex, attitudes toward religion, and
attitudes toward parties. The next column to look at is the coefficient
column. Here look for the sign (whether positive or negative). The sign of
the coefficient indicate the direction of the relationship, whether positive
or negative. Here is the interpretation of these results:
Interpretation: The multiple linear regression model used to explain drinks4
is significant at the 0.0001 level. However, only three (3) variables gender,
religion, parties in the model significantly predict drinks4. In particular,
religion is positively related to drinks4 after controlling for other variables in
the model, suggesting that religiosity decreases the tendency to have four or
more drinks in a row. In other words, college students who are religious are less
likely to engage in binge drinking. On the other hand, gender and parties are
negatively related to drinks4. Specifically, these results imply that males and
students who have favorable attitudes toward parties are more likely to engage
in binge drinking. In sum, binge drinkers are male college students who are not
religious and possess favorable attitudes toward parties.
6. Binary logistic regression

Data analysis tutorial # 10. Determining the relationship between a
group of predictors/independent variables (nominal, ordinal, ratio and
interval) and a nominal (binary) dependent variable. This time we will
attempt to answer this research question:
Can membership in frat/sor be significantly predicted using age,
gender, and attitudes toward athletics, religion, and parties?
123
Predict who are most likely to join fraternities and sororities (fratsor;
Member = 1; Not member = 2) using age, gender, athletic, religion, and
parties.
Step 1: Click Stat > Regression > Binary logistic regression
Step 2: Choose fratsor as your Response and age, gender, athletic,
religioin, and parties as Models independent variables.
124
You can use the steps in interpreting multiple linear regression in

interpreting the results of the binary logistic regression. Here is the
interpretation:
Interpretation: The binary logistic regression model reveals that two factors
significantly predict membership in fraternities and sororities. Specifically,
controlling for other variables, athletic and parties are positively related to
membership in fraternities and sororities. These results suggest that college students
who are athletic and have favorable attitudes towards parties are more likely to join
fraternities and sororities.
Testing mediation and interaction effects of independent variables

The previous multivariate models we have tested are all additive.
That is, we treat each variable to have a direct effect on the dependent
variable. However, it is likely that that these models are just too simple to
explain a complex problem like binge drinking. Some variables in reality
might mediate the relationship between an independent variable and the
dependent variable or two independent variables interact in predicting the
dependent variable. That is, the effect of one independent variable depends
on the values of another independent variable. Look at the three figures
below to differentiate the three types of models. Start with the model that
we have explored so far. Then observe how the other two models that we
will explore later differ from it. We will call the first model as the additive
model; second, mediation model; and third, interaction model.
Additive model
125
Mediation model
Interaction model
Probing mediation
This time we will see whether the effect of age on binge drinking is
mediated by attitudes toward parties. That is, it is quite possible that older
US students engage less in binge drinking in part because they do not love
parties. Here is the research question:
Does love of parties mediate the relationship between age and binge
drinking?
Note: There is mediation when love of parties attenuates or
diminishes the effects of age on binge drinking.
Procedure
To test a mediation hypothesis, you need to build two regression
models
First model: Enter age and gender
Second model: Add love of parties into the base model
In Minitab, execute these steps:
Step 1: Stat > Regression > Regression . ..
Step 2: Enter drinks4 to Response; and age and gender to Predictors >
OK
126
Note that the effect of age in the first model is significant beyond
0.05 level (b=-0.029182, p<0.01), suggesting that older students engage
less in binge drinking compared to younger students. We will now examine
whether such relationship is mediated by love of parties. Follow these
steps in building the second model:
Step 3: Stat > Regression > Regression . ..
Step 4: Enter drinks4 to Response and age, gender, parties to Predictors
> OK
Look at the figure above. You will notice that the effect of age
disappeared, while love of parties significantly predicts binge drinking. The
elimination of the effect of age on binge drinking when love of parties was
included in the model indicates mediation effect. We can construct a table
127
of the results of the two models. Look at the table below and its
interpretation.
Table xy shows the regression models built to probe the mediation effect of love of
parties in the relationship between age and binge drinking. Model 1 suggests that
older students tend to engage less in binge drinking (b = -0.029, p<0.001). However,
when love of parties was entered in Model 2, such relationship was diminished (b =
0.002, p>0.05). Thus, love of parties mediate the relationship between age and binge
drinking. Older students are less likely to engage in binge drinking partially because
they do not love parties.
Probing interaction effect

We can also hypothesize that the effect of age depend on the values
of love of parties. That is, what if an older student love parties? Does this
have an effect on binge drinking? We will now answer this research
question:
Does love of parties moderate the relationship between age and
binge drinking?
Note: There is moderation effect when the interaction term between
age and love of parties significantly affect binge drinking.
Procedure
To test a moderation hypothesis, you need to build at least two
regression models
First model: Enter age and gender
Second model: Add love of parties into the base model
Third model: Add the interaction term (Age x Parties) in the third
model
128
Note: Before building the models, you need first to create the
interaction term between age and love of parties. To do this,
1. Perform mean centering on age and parties
2. Multiply age (mean centered) and parties (mean centered)
Creating an interaction term (variable) between age and attitude toward
parties:
Step 1 (Mean centering age): Calc > Calculator > Input C50 into Store
result in variable > In the Expression box, enter age - 21.162 > Ok >
Name C50 as Age (cntrd)
Step 2 (Mean centering parties): Calc > Calculator > Input C51 into
Store result in variable > In the Expression box, enter parties 3.0381 > Ok > Name C51 as Parties (cntrd)
Step 3 (Creating the interaction term): Calc > Calculator > Input C52
into Store result in variable > In the Expression box, enter 'Age
(cntrd)' * 'Parties (cntrd) > Ok > name C52 as Age x Parties
Step 4: Stat > Regression > Regression> Enter drinks4 to Response

and age, gender, parties, and Age x Parties to Predictors
129
From these results, we can build a table of the model like the one
below:
Interpretation:
st
(1 paragraph: Interpretation of Model 1 & 2 above)

Model 3 was built to probe the interaction effect of Age x Parties on binge drinking. As
seen, the Age x Parties does not significantly predict binge drinking (b = 0.00538,
p>0.05), suggesting that the effect of age of students on binge drinking is not affected
by their attitudes toward of parties.
130
LESSON 7 EXERCISES
Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Gather data or provide a statistical data set and perform the data
analysis techniques in this Lesson. That is, calculate the mean,
median, percentage, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation, multiple linear
regression, and binary logistic regression.
2. Paste you Minitab results in a Microsoft word and write your
interpretation for every result.
131
References
Cohen, J. (1968). Multiple regression as a general data-analytic system.
Psychological Bulletin, 70(6), 426-443.
Cohen, J., Cohen, P., West, S.G., & Aiken, L.S. (2003). Applied multiple
regression/correlation analysis for the behavioral sciences (3rd Ed).
Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
Cronbach, L. J. (1957). The two disciplines of scientific psychology.
American psychologist, 12, 671-684.
Field, A. (2013). Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS statistics and sex
and drugs and rock n roll (4th Ed). London: SAGE Publications
Ltd.
Gottfredson, M. & Hirschi, T. (1990). A general theory of crime. Stanford,
CA: Stanford University Press.
Kuiper, S. & Sklar, J. (2013). Practicing statistics: Guided investigations
for the second course. Pearson.
LaGrange, T. C., & Silverman, R. A. (1999). Low self-control and
opportunity: Testing the general theory of crime as an explanation
for gender differences in delinquency. Criminology, 37(1), 41-72.
Weinberg, S.L. & Abramowitz, S.K. (2008). Statistics using SPSS: An
integrative approach. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
132
LESSON 8
AN INTRODUCTION TO CRIME ANALYSIS AND CRIME MAPPING
After reading this chapter, the learner shall be able to:
1. state the functions of crime analysis and crime
mapping within policing strategies;
2. define and differentiate crime analysis and crime
mapping;
3. summarize the history of crime mapping; and
4. state the importance of GIS in crime mapping.
Introduction
Law enforcement can gain much from the use of cutting-edge
technology in reducing and controlling crimes. Several areas of law
enforcement functions benefit from the use of technology (e.g., in crime
detection, crime investigation, and crime prevention). In crime
investigation, for instance, police officers use cutting-edge technology to
collect, preserve, and analyze evidence such as blood, hair, prints, DNA
evidence, questioned documents, and other objects of evidentiary value.
This approach has gained much popularity because of its presence in
media outlets. For example, the popular TV series CSI portrays some real
life events and simulated crime scene investigations using sophisticated
tools to uncover mysteries in each of the crime incident portrayed.
However, the popularity of crime investigation techniques in the
media is not commensurate to its effectiveness. Previous research
demonstrated the futility of crime investigation and other traditional police
strategies (i.e., rapid response, random patrol, and reactive investigation
The 3 Rs) in reducing significant proportion of crimes (Weisburd & Eck,
2004). One of the earliest studies on the ineffectiveness of criminal
investigation in the reduction of crime was conducted in the early 1970s
by Greenwood and Petersilia (1975). They found out that investigative
training, staffing, workload, and procedures, organization in the
investigation division of all law enforcement agencies in the US that had
150 or more employees did not significantly increased chances of arrests,
clearance rates, and did not reduce crime. These findings led them to
conclude that reactive investigation does not work in reducing crime. This,
however, does not mean that the 3Rs in policing are not needed in the
police department. Instead, police agencies must funnel more focus on
proactive approaches and less on reactive ones.
133
Previous research revealed the ineffectiveness of reactive approach

in policing; thus, innovative policing strategies, which are proactive in
nature, were initiated in the last quarter of the 20th century. These
strategies include community policing, proactive policing, hot spots
policing, and intelligence-led policing, a recent innovation in the 21st
century. Of these strategies, problem-oriented policing and hot spots
policing are the ones back with sufficient evidence on their effectiveness to
reduce crime (Weisburd & Eck, 2004). It should be noted, however, that a
recent review of recent found that problem-oriented policing is more
effective than hot spots policing (Braga, Papachristos & Hureau, 2012).
However, before hot spots policing and problem-oriented policing are
conducted, there is a need first to conduct thorough analyses of crimes.
This is so because hot spots policing requires the identification of hot spots
areas (see e.g., Sherman & Weisburd, 1995) as well as in problem-oriented
policing where analysis is an integral part of the process (Goldstein, 1979).
The last two decades saw the rise in tapping technology to address
pressing issues confronting law enforcement agencies, especially in crime
analysis and crime mapping. For example, the New York City experienced
an explosion of crime incidents in the 1980s; thus making the citys tag
as Crime Capital of the World or The Rotten Apple. However, when
William Bratton took over as the New York Police Commissioner, the city
experienced a huge decrease of crime in the 1990s (Bratton, 2005).
Thanks to the Compstat (short for computer statistics) management
process where field commanders were regularly required identify,
monitory, and address innovatively crime patterns in their respective
jurisdictions. Each meeting commanders were asked of the crime situation
in their areas of concern and to formulate strategies in line with problemoriented policing. The commanders then displayed crime statistics
including crime maps and other crime analysis products. The success of
the approach led to the diffusion of Compstat to many police departments
across the US (Weisburd et al., 2003) and to other countries such as in
Australia (Mazerolle, McBroom & Rombouts, 2011).
Compstat processes benefit from the availability of computers to
make crime analysis faster and easier. For example, crime analysis can be
done though crime mapping utilizing geographical information system
(GIS). A GIS software is a computer-enabled device of collating, analyzing,
and visualizing crime patterns, thereby producing computerized maps. As
a crime prevention tool (Weisburd & McEwen, 1998), the use of
computerized crime mapping has diffused to many crime departments in
the US (Weisburd & Lum, 2005). The GIS can be used to produce crime
maps serving the purpose of different types of crime analysis within police
134
departments (i.e., in intelligence analysis, tactical analysis, operational

analysis, strategic analysis, and administrative analysis) (Santos, 2013).
Indeed, GIS and its tools are an important weapon towards the reduction
of crime.
In the Philippine setting, however, the cost and the complexity of
close source, mainstream GIS software and other spatial analysis tools
hinder their diffusion to police departments in the country. For instance
in 2004, the Muntinlupa City Police launched the first ever Geographical
Information and Crime Mapping System in the country (Punay, 2004).
The system was expected to help in automating the mapping of crimes
recently committed thereby aiding in the pursuit of offenders. However,
the cost of the system amounted to 7.5 million pesos. This is a relatively
huge amount considering the dwindling resources of the Philippine
National Police. Thus, few police departments have followed and imitated
the initiatives in the Muntinlupa Police Office. It is for this reason that
this book was conceptualized. Open source GIS software and tools provide
a viable alternative to commercial GIS. Open source GIS is free of cost and
is open for modifications and innovations. Thus, the Philippine police can
gain much from this technology especially in a country where Doing More
with Less is needed.
Policing Strategies and Crime Mapping
The discussion and, especially, the implementation of the crime
analysis using crime mapping cannot be fully successful without the use
of policing strategies as its backcloth. To have a thorough understanding
of crime mapping, crime analysts and police leaders must understand first
the purpose why crime analysis and crime mapping exist in the context of
policing. This section is critical as police leaders and crime analyst may
misconceive the primary purpose of crime analysis and crime mapping in
the Philippine setting. For instance, when the chief of police of the
Muntinlupa Police was interviewed on the use of the newly established
crime mapping system in the city, he pointed out that the system was very
helpful in aiding police hot pursuits thereby adding efficiency of their
Dragnet Operations (Punay, 2004). This explication is unfortunate.
Although crime mapping can be used for reactive purposes such as in hot
pursuits and criminal investigation but the primary purpose of this tool is
for crime prevention, not to mention that the primary function of law
enforcement is the prevention of crimes (CPRM, 2006). Thus, a short
discussion of the different policing strategies that led to the proliferation
of crime analysis and crime mapping deserves a place in this manual.
Table 1 presents the policing eras, and policing strategies with evidence of
their effectiveness.
135
Table 1
Reform Eras, Policing Strategies, and Evidence of Effectiveness in Curbing
Crime
Policing Eras
Political
Reform era
Community problemsolving era
Policing Strategies
Not Definite,
Rudimentary
Traditional policing
(Random patrol, rapid
response, reactive
investigations)
Evidence of
Effectiveness
No Evidence
Very weak evidence
Community policing
Weak evidence
Problem-oriented
policing
Hot spots policing
Strong evidence
Moderate to strong
evidence
Policing has undergone several shifts of paradigm and these shifts

can be divided into three eras. Kelling and Moore (2005) explicated that
policing strategies underwent these three successive eras:
1. The Political Era (1840s early 1900s)

Easily discernible from its name, the nature of policing in this era
was mainly political. Police derive its legitimacy from close
relationships with political leaders and the populace. Although it
had some advantages, like favorable relationships with the people
and politicians it suffered on police corruption, political corruption
and patronage, and defective organization.
2. The Reform Era (1930s-late 1970s)
Because of the failure of the political era, police leaders and scholars
(led by August Vollmer and his student O.W. Wilson) attempted to
reform police departments by espousing professionalism and
improving the efficiency of the police. Indeed, police departments
were cleaned and organized and there was commendable
professionalism in the force. The era used the 3Rs in Policing: (1)
random patrol; (2) rapid response; and (3) reactive investigation.
However, no matter how efficient the police was, it was not
136
successful in curbing crime. Thus, police scholars began to rethink

the functions of the police department.
3. The Community-problem Solving Era (Late 1970s-Present)
Research in the late 1970s discovered that the 3Rs in policing did
not actually reduce crime. No matter how efficient police was as long
as it did not focus its resources on communitys problems that were
breeding crimes, police efficiency was inadequate as an approach in
policing. Thus, scholars (led by Herman Goldstein) posited that
police was so preoccupied with the means in policing and forgetting
the ends, and there was a need to adopt a problem-oriented
approach (Goldstein, 1979). The era combined political,
professional, and problem-focused approaches. Consequently, fruits
of this approach began to manifest, crimes were significantly
reduced.
At this point, the policing strategies created by the reform era and
community-problem solving era will be explicated. The reform era
popularized the 3Rs in policing (Traditional policing): (1) random patrol,
(2) rapid response, and (3) problem-oriented policing. On the other hand,
the community problem-solving era adopted these three policing
strategies: (1) community policing, (2) problem-oriented policing, and (3)
hot spots policing. Weisburd and Eck (2004) provide a discussion and
review of effectiveness of the following policing strategies.
1. Traditional Policing
The by-product of the reform era towards police efficiency and
professionalism is the traditional policing, which is characterized
mainly by police being reactive in the fight against crime. Traditional
policing employs the 3Rs in policing, namely: random patrol, rapid
response, and reactive investigations. The era espoused the idea
that random patrol using mobile patrol cars would create an
impression that the police was omnipresent, and offenders would be
easily arrested because of the mobility of patrol cars. Rapid response
was also expected to increase the probability of the arrest of
offenders when police arrived at the crime scene at the least possible
time, thereby reducing crime occurrences. Lastly, reactive
investigation (e.g. crime scene investigation) was also expected to
increase the probability of identifying and arresting persons
responsible for the particular crime. Conceptually, the idea of the
3Rs is promising; however, research revealed evidence on the
ineffectiveness of this approach. For instance, the first policing
experiment in the world, The Kansas City Preventive Patrol
137
Experiment, found that adding or decreasing police mobile patrols

did not reduce crime (Kelling et al., 1974).
2. Community Policing
In the late 1970s, a study was conducted to analyze police response
time in Kansas City (Kansas City Police Department, 1977). The
study found out that it is not the response time of the police that
increases the chance of arrest of offenders but reporting time of the
citizens. That is, when citizens report criminal acts immediately the
probability of arresting the offenders increases. This and other
related studies provided a stepping stone of police scholars to
propose community policing. This policing strategy aims to increase
the trust and confidence of the public on the police, and to eliminate
fear of crime, thereby creating a climate where the public could freely
and willingly report offenses. Programs in this strategy include
community meetings, neighborhood watch, storefront offices, and
information campaigns. However, these programs do not actually
reduce crime as evidenced by numerous studies in the past (see
Weisburd & Eck, 2004).
3. Hotspots Policing
Hot spots policing originated from the works of Sherman et al. (1989)
and Sherman (1995). Sherman and colleagues (1989) found that
crime are concentrated at few, small places in the community the
crime hot spots. Specifically, only 3% of the addresses in
Minneapolis, USA produced 50% of the overall police dispatches in
the city. Sherman (1995:36) defines crime hot spots as small places
in which the occurrence of crime is so frequent that it is highly
predictable, at least over a one year period. Hot spots policing is a
police strategy of placing additional police resources (e.g. patrols) at
targeted crime hot spots. The first hot spots policing experiment was
conducted by Sherman and Weisburd (1995) at crime hot spots in
Minneapolis. The experimental treatment of placing about twice
more patrols at some crime hot spots produces significant decreases
in crime and disorder levels at those places than at controlled ones.
Subsequent reviews of studies found strong evidence of the
effectiveness of hot spots policing in reducing crime (see e.g. Braga,
2001 and Braga et al., 2012). However, Braga et al. (2012) found
that problem-oriented policing is better than hot spots policing in
reducing crime.
138
4. Problem-oriented Policing
Problem-oriented policing (POP) was also a result of the discontent
on traditional focus of policing. Herman Goldstein (1979) rethought
the real purpose of policing and posited that the true function of the
police is to analyze and solve problems in the community, thereby
suggesting a more focused policing strategies. Lamenting the
scattered and fragmented approach of the traditional approach in
policing, Goldstein stated that police should determine the problems
that bother community members. The problem must then be
analyzed so that tailored responses be formulated and implemented.
The process culminates with the assessment of the effectiveness of
the responses. This problem solving approach was later defined and
elaborated by Eck and Spelman (1987) as the SARA process. The
SARA process represents scanning, analysis, response and
assessment.
At this point, the SARA process is illustrated in a real problemsolving story in Newark, New Jersey, USA (see Zanin, Shane &
Clarke, 2004). In this story, the problem-solving efforts using the
SARA by the police, police scholars and the community are
elaborated.
Scanning (What is the problem?)
Policing must not be like a shotgun approach that employs many
resources but not focused on a target, thereby wasting considerable
amount of those resources. In the scanning stage, this situation is
being avoided as the police and the community involved in the
process conduct informative analysis on what is the problem that
bothers the residents. In Newark, researchers, the community and
the police recognized that the drug problem in the city was really
problematic. Initially, the researchers conducted ride-along
activities together with the police at the problematic places to get a
better insight on how drug dealing in the apartment complexes
worked. Simultaneously, arrest records were retrieved to discover
the extent of the problem. Density maps of the illicit drug acts were
created using GIS, which results to the visualization of drug hot
spots of the city. The scanning stage then proceeded with the
identification of 20 hot spot apartments for drug dealing, then
narrowed down to three most problematic apartment complexes that
produces most of the drug dealings.
139
Analysis (What causes the problem?)

In the analysis stage, the police together with the community
attempt to discover the cause of the problem or the factors that
increase the levels of the problem. This stage uses statistical and
research methods to uncover the hidden factors that likely influence
the problem. In Newark, the researchers and the police discovered
that the drug dealing activities in the problematic sites were
intensified by the easy access to the sites by mobile out-of-town drug
buyers. This fact supports the contention that opportunity is a prerequisite to the commission of crime (Felson & Clarke, 1998).
Borrowing from the insights from broken windows theory (Wilson &
Kelling, 1982; Wagers, Sousa & Kelling, 2008), the problem solving
team also considered fixing disorder and fire, health and building
code violations in problematic apartment complexes as these
conditions also contributed to the breakdown social control in those
places, thereby improving management of the complexes.
Response (What is the proper response to the problem?)
What makes POP unique is its focused approach characterized by
identifying certain problems and conditions that intensify them, and
subsequently focusing on these problems and conditions using
diversified approaches other than police resources. Interventions
against problems include police and community resources to solve
such problems. In Newark drug problem, the intervention was
divided into two: traffic intervention and police intervention. Traffic
intervention aimed at making the drug dealing sites less accessible
for out-of-towners. The intervention resulted in rerouting of traffic
and placing ramps, thereby making access to the drug dealing sites
more difficult. Police interventions, on the other hand, were
conducted through fire, health, and building code violation
abatements, and surveillance and arrests against drug offenders.
Assessment (Does the response work?)
Assessment aims at determining whether the response to the
problem works. In this way, programs that work against crime will
be documented and alternative responses may be tapped. Various
evaluation methods may be employed aside from measuring crime
levels. These methods may include fear of crime levels and
community satisfaction. The report of Zanin, Shane & Clarke (2004)
did not yet include the result of the assessment stage because the
project was still on-going while writing the report. Nevertheless, the
evaluation, as planned by the implementers, would include: (1)
140
analyzing drug arrest, shootings and homicides data; (2) observation

of drug deals at the complexes; (3) and analysis of traffic flow data.
All of these were planned to be conducted after the implementation
of the project and to be compared with data gathered before the
implementation.
All of the policing strategies discussed in this section can be aided
by crime analysis, especially crime mapping. In fact, in hot spots policing
and problem-oriented policing analysis and mapping of crime have become
indispensable. In hot spots policing, for example, police cannot proceed
to the allocation of additional forces without determining (by crime
mapping) first which places deserve such allocation so as not to waste
resources. Table 2 summarizes the possible crime mapping products that
can aid policing strategies (see Santos, 2013).
Table 2
Crime mapping products for the policing strategies
Policing Strategy
Traditional policing
Hot spots policing
Problem-oriented
policing
Type of Crime
Analysis
Criminal investigative
analysis
Tactical or operational
analysis
Strategic crime
analysis
Intelligence analysis
Crime Mapping
Product
Map of possible future
locations of crimes by
serial offenders
Map of crime hot
spots
Map of problematic
areas and the
conditions associated
with the problem/s
Map of addresses of
offenders in relation to
crime hot spots
Crime Mapping Requirements

In this section, crime mapping using easy-to-use free GIS
applications and other tools is presented. The routines are easy, aided by
graphical user interface (GUI) of the software programs used in this
tutorial. One who knows how to use GUI applications (e.g. Microsoft Word,
Excel) would find the routines in this tutorial relatively easy to perform.
One only needs to use the computer mouse and keyboard to execute
commands. In addition, these routines can be performed using a personal
computer or a laptop.
141
Hardware Requirements
These routines are to be performed in a 32-bit personal computer or
a laptop running within a Windows environment. Of course, one can
explore these crime mapping routines in other hardware
environments.
Software Requirements
The tutorial cannot begin without installing first these FREE
applications on your computer from the internet:
1. GIS applications.
Download the QGIS version 2.0.1 application from
http://www.qgis.org/en/site/forusers/download.html.
Functionalities: To visualize and create digital maps
2. Spatial and Temporal Analysis application
Download the CrimeStat program version 3.3 from
http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/CrimeStat/download.html and
GeoDa application from
http://geodacenter.asu.edu/software/downloads.
Functionalities: To conduct spatial and temporal statistical
analysis
3. Zip and Unzip Software
For this tutorial, we use the 7-Zip software freely
downloadable from http://www.7-zip.org/.
Functionalities: To extract/open zipped files as well as to zip
files.
4. LibreOffice
Download LibreOffice Main Installer version 4.1.4 from
http://www.libreoffice.org/download.
Functionalities: To be used as spreadsheet for files to be saved
as dBASE (.dbf) files
The tutorial also needs proprietary software such as
Microsoft Word and Excel.
Types of Hot Spot Mapping
Hot spot mapping can be categorized into three: point mapping,
choropleth mapping, and kernel density estimation. Figure 1 shows the
three types of hot spot mapping. Map A presents a point map. The
Administrative boundaries (barangays) of the city are overlaid with points.
142
These points represent the crimes committed at those locations. As seen

also, the points are overlaid with ellipses (the oblong red rings) signifying
the extent of crime hot spots. Map B, on the other hand, presents another
type of hot spot map. Instead of points, the barangay units are shaded
with graduated colors signifying crime levels. Blue signifies the lowest
density (crimes per square kilometer) of crimes; whereas, the red colored
unit has the highest density of property crimes. Lastly, Map C presents
the kernel density estimation map. To present hot spots and cold spots,
KDE method interpolates the points on the map calculating the
approximate intensity level of crimes per grid cell using all or almost all
points on the map, resulting to a smooth patterning of crime hot spots.
The red portions of the interpolated areas represent the hot spots of
property crimes.
Figure 1. Types of hot spot mapping: (A) point mapping, (A) choropleth
mapping, and (C) kernel density estimation.
143
Components of a Crime Map

To have a sense on what
compose a digital crime map, let us
first analyze some sample maps
before we begin. Figure 1 shows the
property crime map of Dumaguete
City, 2010-2012 taken from the
study of Barrera, Cagang and
Capistrano (2013).
The map is kernel density
estimation (KDE) map visualizing the
hot spots of property crimes in
Dumaguete City from 2010-2012. As
seen from the figure, there are two
hot spot areas in the city areas that
are more prone to property crimes
such as theft, robbery, carnapping,
among others. The first hot spot is
located east of the city while the 2nd
hot spot is on the northern part of the
city.
Figure 2. Hot spots of property

crimes in Dumaguete City, 20102012
Looking at Figure 1, what do you think are the components of the

crime map? To answer this question, the following separated and identified
each of the composition of the digital map.
1. Map Label. The map label describes what the map is all about,
including the place and time period of the data used.
2. North Arrow and Map Scale. North arrow identifies the orientation
of the map while the numerical scale signifies the size of the map (1
cm of the map represents 63,688 cm).
144
3. Legend. The legend identifies the map layers (i.e., hot spots, city
streets, base map) that compose the map.
4. Map Layers. The map layers are composed of overlaid shapefiles. In

this example, we can see three layers: base map (administrative
boundary of Dumaguete City, the city streets, and the KDE layer.
Additional contents of the map may include the geocoding hit rate.
For the current map the geocoding hit rate is above 95%. Thus, current
analysis of property crime hot spot is unbiased by missing data values.
Component Number 1 through 3 can be created out from the data
in the GIS application, in which the routines are fairly straightforward
provided that one has the data for the layers. What we really need are the
data needed to create the layers in the GIS.
145
LESSON 8.1 EXERCISES

Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. What is the difference between crime mapping and crime analysis?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2. What are the types of crime analysis and what crime mapping
techniques are required of each of these types.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
3. Discuss how each type of crime analysis would facilitate the types
of policing.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
4. Go to Google Scholar and look for a research article that uses crime
mapping techniques. Summarize this article in a one page essay.
Tip: Include in the essay the objective of the research, the theory (if
any), methods, main results, and implications of the results.
146
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PRISM
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Sherman, L.W. (1995). Hot spots of crime and criminal careers of places,
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149
Crime mapping using open source materials

Crime mapping is fundamental in the deployment of the limited
police and community resources for crime prevention and control. The
successes in integrating crime mapping in policing, scientific efforts and
advances in criminology, the advent of low-cost computer, the availability
of geographic information system (GIS) and related tools, and, of course,
the accessibility of the internet, have helped diffuse computerized crime
mapping in most police departments in western countries, especially in
the US (Weisburd & Lum, 2005; Taylor et al., 2011). With this, several
books, guides, and manuals exist for crime mapping purposes (see e.g.
Boba, 2001; Caplan, 2010; Eck et al., 2005; Harries, 1999; Gorr, 2001).
However, the practice of crime mapping has been monopolized by
proprietary GIS software and tools. For instance, through its web site, the
National Archive of Criminal Justice Data in U.S offers crime mapping
tutorial
to
criminal
justice
professionals
and
educators
(http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/NACJD/). The workbooks in the
tutorial were written by the authors using ArcView and MapInfo GIS (see
Gorr, 2001 and Gorr & Wells, 2001). The same approach of using ArcView
GIS in his crime mapping guide was done by Caplan (2010). Although they
are excellent products, ArcView and MapInfo are proprietary GIS; and the
procurement of these programs would cost a police department thousands
of dollars for GIS alone. For instance, the first ever crime mapping system
in the Philippines that was set up at the Muntinlupa City Police Office
amounted to 7.5 million pesos (Punay, 2004). This is unfortunate because
most police departments in developing countries have limited financial
resources.
Recent research finds that police departments do not necessarily
need expensive crime mapping systems to accomplish most crime mapping
routines, and these departments demand for easy to use crime mapping
GIS software and tools (Perry et al., 2013; Roth et al., 2013). In this article,
it is argued that free and open source (FOS) GIS tools and volunteered
geographic information (VGI) can fulfill this need. Some experts in GIS and
in crime mapping hinted on the potential utility of FOS GIS and VGI (e.g.
Anselin, 2010; Ratcliffe, 2010; Goodchild, 2007; Caplan, 2010). To date,
however, there is no available work that describes what FOS GIS and VGI
resources that could be used in crime mapping and how these tools could
be integrated for such purpose.
Now I will present an applied research with demonstration of its
application. Potential FOS desktop GIS, VGI, and related tools that could
be utilized in crime mapping will be explicated. In addition, the utility of
these tools will be demonstrated in a case study of carnapping, robbery,
and theft offenses in Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental, Philippines. With
150
this, ill-funded police departments are given an option to do more with less
in crime mapping and crime analysis. The paper proceeds by explicating:
(a) crime analysis, especially crime mapping; (b) conventional proprietary
GIS tools and their free open source alternatives; and finally (c) the utility
of these alternative tools will be demonstrated in the analysis of robbery
and theft offenses in the city of Dumaguete.
Crime Mapping in Crime Analysis
Crime analysis has gained current surge of interests from
researchers and practitioners. Its utility in testing and informing theory
and practice is greatly recognized in the field of environmental criminology
(Wortley & Mazerolle, 2008). Crime analysis, however, is not a new
invention (Santos, 2013). Conceivably, it is as old as the ability of humans
to contemplate and analyze series of events and find patterns, especially
patterns of crime events. Crime analysis is the systematic study of crime
and disorder problems as well as other police-related issuesincluding
socio-demographic, spatial, and temporal factorsto assist the police in
criminal apprehension, crime and disorder reduction, crime prevention,
and evaluation (Santos, 2013:2). Santos (2013) provides six distinct but
complementary types of crime analysis: intelligence analysis, criminal
investigative analysis, tactical crime analysis, strategic crime analysis,
operations analysis, and administrative crime analysis. All of these types
can be aided with crime mapping (see Santos, 2013: 63 for some
examples).
Crime mapping is used by researchers and practitioners to visualize
crime patterns in space and time (Harries, 1999; Eck et al., 2005; Anselin
et al., 2008). Santos (2013:5) defines crime mapping as the process of
using a geographic information system to conduct spatial analysis of crime
and disorder problems as well as other police-related issues. Perhaps,
crime mapping is of its greatest utility in hot spots analysis (Anselin et al.,
2008). Crime hot spots are places that have above average crime
concentration in a particular jurisdiction (Eck, 2005). The concept of crime
hot spots gained much attention after Sherman et al. (1989) discovered
that half of the calls for predatory crime to the police came from only 3
percent of all addresses and intersections in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA.
Hot spot analysis was previously done through manual pin mapping;
however, with its inherent tedious nature, the method was replaced by
computerized methods using Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and
related tools (Anselin et al., 2008; Harries, 1999; Weisburd & Lum, 2005).
The identification of crime patterns informs both theory and
practice. For researchers, crime patterns may support or modify existing
crime theories like routine activity approach, rational choice perspective,
and the crime pattern theory (Wortley & Mazerolle, 2008). In the same way,
151
identification of crime patterns is fundamental to modern policing

strategies. For example, there is now a growing practice of adopting
problem-oriented policing and hot spot policing approaches towards crime
prevention. These approaches are place-based, focused, and found to be
effective by previous studies (see Weisburd & Eck, 2004 for a review). What
is fundamental to these approaches is crime analysis, especially crime
mapping to identify places that should receive higher dosage of crime
prevention resources.
Geographical Information System and Related Tools
The adoption of computerized mapping by US law enforcement
departments continues to increase and follows a diffusion process
(Weisburd & Lum, 2005). A recent survey in the US reveals that most law
enforcement agencies employs a crime analyst and use crime analysis
products such as crime maps to aid police operations (Taylor et al., 2011).
The survey also uncovers the top 3 barriers to the implementation of crime
analysis within police departments, namely: not enough personnel, not
enough funding, and lack of adequate hard/software tools. Computerized
crime mapping requires several tools to perform (Higgins, 2003).
Fundamental to creating maps are hardware and software tools (e.g.
Desktop GIS).
The work horse of crime mapping is the desktop GIS. A desktop
GIS is a mapping software that is installed onto and runs on a personal
computer and allows users to display, query, update, and analyze data
about geographic locations and the information linked to those locations
(ESRI, 2014). A desktop GIS can either be proprietary or free and open
source. The most commonly used desktop GIS for crime mapping in
western countries are proprietary GIS such as MapInfo, ArcView, and
ArcInfo (Mamalian and La Vigne et al., 1999).
Crime mapping, however, often goes beyond mapping (Anselin et al.,
2008). Mere mapping volumes of crime may fail to identify crime patterns.
Often, a crime analyst needs to conduct spatial statistical analysis for a
variety of reasons such as, but not limited to: (1) to determine whether
crimes points or crime aggregated to areal units are randomly distributed
or not, (2) to smooth crime concentrations in order to highlight the existing
patterns not otherwise visible, and (3) to predict the location of the next
attack by an offender (see Anselin et al., 2000). Most desktop GIS, however,
lack spatial statistics commonly used in crime analysis. Thus, an analyst
needs other programs that anallyze crime points or aggregated crimes to
polygons. These programs include CrimeStat (Levine, 2006), GeoDa
(Anselin et al., 2006), and Near Repeat Calculator (Ratcliffe, 2008).
Fortunately, these programs are easy-to-use, free, and downloadable from
the web.
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Free and Open Source GIS and Volunteered Geographic Information

Aside from their cost, proprietary programs are complex with steep
learning curves (Ratcliffe, 2009). Thus, practitioners demand for
alternative crime mapping tools that overcome these limitations (Roth et
al., 2013). In addition, most predictive policing products can be produced
using less expensive/free and readily available programs (Perry et al.,
2013). In this subsection, free and open source (FOS) GIS and volunteered
geographic information will be explored.
The FOS movement might be mistaken for being a result of the
desire to have free-of-cost GIS (Steiniger & Hunter, 2013). This movement,
actually, resulted from discontent towards restrictions in accessing source
codes and modifying programs in the 1960s and 1970s. Thus, some
programmers chose to develop programs that anybody could use and
modify for free (Steiniger & Hay, 2009). The movement was largely of the
desire for freedom (Steiniger & Hunter, 2013). The term free and open
source implies that a GIS is free-of-cost; and its source code is open for
modification to users.
There are numerous FOS desktop GIS that are available to
researchers and practitioners (Steiniger & Hay, 2009). These programs
include mature GIS and those that are still on an early development stage.
The reviews of Steiniger & Bocher (2009) and Steiniger & Hay (2009)
describe eight mature FOS desktop GIS: (1) GRASS GIS, (2) QGIS, (3)
ILWIS, (4) uDig, (5) SAGA, (6) OpenJUMP, (7) MapWindow GIS, and (8)
gvSIG. These FOS GIS possess functionalities comparable to commercial
ones, software support, and international user and developer
communities. Perhaps the most popular FOS GIS is the GRASS GIS
because of its decades-old history. However, GRASS has a complex user
interface; and thus, often demands an experienced user level. In this
paper, the QGIS desktop GIS is preferred for crime mapping purposes not
only because of its friendly, easy to use interface, but also because it
outperforms other FOS GIS in terms of several important criteria.
Chen et al. (2010) assessed and tested over 30 FOS desktop GIS in
choosing FOS GIS suited for water resources management in developing
countries. They used three levels of assessment: (1) preliminary selection
based on functionalities, complexity, maturity, cross-platform
requirements, and popularity; (2) secondary selection by weighting and
ranking method using the criteria of internet connection and security,
operation system, programming language, complexity, data format and
database, maturity, installation and test running, and functionalities; and
(3) data processing speed and advanced functionalities for water resources
153
management. The results of these tests revealed that QGIS outperformed

other FOS GIS in almost all criteria.
Limitations of FOS Desktop GIS
There are at least two major challenges when using FOS desktop
GIS for crime mapping. FOS GIS lacks spatial data analysis routines
(Anselin, 2012). To fill this void, QGIS can be used in conjunction with
some easy-to-use, free-of-cost spatial statistics programs such as
CrimeStat, GeoDa, and Near Repeat Calculator. CrimeStat is a powerful
spatial statistics software designed specifically to perform routines aimed
to analyze crime events (Levine, 2006). Unlike CrimeStat that needs a GIS
to visualize the results, GeoDa is a stand-alone program that analyzes and
visualizes the results (Anselin et al., 2006). Finally, the Near Repeat
Calculator can recognize patterns of near repeat victimization across space
and time (Ratcliffe, 2008).
FOS GIS lacks base data sets like basemaps and road networks
(Ratcliffe, 2009). This challenge, however, can be overcome through the
use of volunteered geographic information created and monitored by
volunteers on the web (Goodchild, 2007). Potential applications include
OpenStreetMap
(http://www.openstreetmap.org/),
Google
Maps
(https://maps.google.com/),
and
GADM
Database
(http://www.gadm.org/). OpenStreetMap provides road networks that
could be used as an overlay on a map. Google Maps and GADM can be
used as base maps. In addition, there are many websites that utilize the
map layers of OpenStretMap, Google Maps, and other web mapping
applications to perform geocoding; for example, GPS Visualizer
(www.gpsvisualizer.com/)
and
Find
Latitude
and
Longitude
(http://www.findlatitudeandlongitude.com/). Geocoding crimes is the
process of converting crime locations, often represented as street
addresses, into latitude and longitude coordinates (Anselin et al., 2008;
Police Foundation, 2000). In this paper, the utility of the geocoding
services of Find Latitude and Longitude, which uses Google Map as
reference layer, was explored.
An Application of FOS GIS and VGI Resources to Crime Mapping
Preparing crime mapping tools
As explicated earlier, computerized crime mapping requires
hardware and software tools (see Higgins, 2003 for the mandatory and
optional requirements). One needs to have at least a laptop or a personal
computer in order to perform computerized crime mapping. If these are
readily available in the police office, then it is not a problem. Software
requirements can be acquired free-of-cost. LibreOffice, an excellent free
version of the Microsoft Office applications (for e.g. Microsoft Excel, Word,
154
Access), is also available and downloadable from the web

(www.libreoffice.org/). However, one can use Microsoft Office if it is readily
available in the office. In this paper, LibreOffice applications such as Writer
Document and Calc Spreadsheet were used. Of course, the work horse
of crime mapping (i.e., the desktop GIS) is fundamental to the current
purpose. The recent version of the QGIS, as of this writing, Valmiera (see
Figure 1), is free and downloadable from its website (www.qgis.org/). All
maps created for this paper were produced using QGIS. For spatial
analysis,
download
Crimestat
III
from
http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/CrimeStat/
and
GeoDa
from
https://geodacenter.asu.edu/software/downloads.
In
this
paper,
CrimeStat was used to analyze the crime points. The installations of these
programs are relatively easy; just follow the instructions given during the
installation process. It should be noted, however, that only point analysis
is demonstrated in this paper.
Figure 1. Graphical user interface of QGIS 2.2.0-Valmiera.

Preparing the crime data
Most police departments collect information about the crime event.
These information include the date, time, address where the crime was
perpetrated, and other related information. Usually, these information are
encoded already in a data table like the one shown in Table 1. Table 1
presents a sample format of the database of some of the robbery (N=311),
theft (N=486), and carnapping (N=125) incidents that were reported to the
police in Dumaguete City from 2010 to 2012. In the table, only a sample
of cases is shown as an illustration; however, all observations were used
155
to produce the crime mapping products shown later in this section. If the
data are not yet encoded then one may encode the data in this format
using Calc or Excel.
Table 1. Sample database format for computerized crime mapping.
ID
Year Month Day Day2 Hour Location
00001 2010 Jan
1
Fri
7:45
Flores
Ave.,
Dumaguete City
00002 2010 Feb
13
Sat
8:15
Miciano
Rd.,
Dumaguete City
00003 2010 Jul
28
Fri
7:45
Dr. V. Locsin St.,
Dumaguete City
00004 2011 Feb
17
Thu
3:00
Colon Extension,
Dumaguete City
00005 2011 Apr
13
Wed 22:30 Quezon
Park,
Dumaguete City
00006 2011 May
4
Wed 6:30
San
Jose
Extension,
Dumaguete City
00007 2012 Jan
2
Mon 8:45
Cathedral Church,
Dumaguete City
00008 2012 Oct
27
Sat
13:00 Perdices
St.,
Dumaguete City
00009 2012 Nov
6
Sat
2:00
Hibbard
Ave.,
Dumaguete City
00010 2012 Dec
11
Sun
14:40 Teves
St.,
Dumaguete City
Crime
Theft
Robbery
Carnapping
Theft
Carnapping
Carnapping
Robbery
Theft
Theft
Theft
The next step of the preparation would be to geocode the crime

locations into geographic coordinates longitude (X) and latitude (Y).
These coordinates were used by QGIS to plot individual crime points on
the map. The current data were geocoded using the website of Find
Latitude and Longitude. The website uses Google Maps with VGI such as
place (country, province, city/municipality), street, and building names to
geocode addresses. Using the Batch Geocode command, it took 1.865
seconds to geocode the 10 addresses in Table 1. The resulting database
with coordinates are shown in Table 2.
156
Table 2. Crime data table with geocoded coordinates (latitude and longitude).
ID
Year
Month
Day1
Day
Hour
00001
2010
Jan
Fri
7:45
00002
2010
Feb
13
Sat
8:15
00003
2010
Jul
28
Fri
7:45
00004
2011
Feb
17
Thu
3:00
00005
2011
Apr
13
Wed
22:30
00006
2011
May
Wed
6:30
00007
2012
Jan
Mon
8:45
00008
2012
Oct
27
Sat
13:00
00009
2012
Nov
Sat
2:00
00010
2012
Dec
11
Sun
14:40
Location
Flores Ave.,
Dumaguete
City
Miciano
Rd.,
Dumaguete
City
Dr. V.
Locsin St.,
Dumaguete
City
Colon
Extension,
Dumaguete
City
Quezon
Park,
Dumaguete
City
San Jose
Extension,
Dumaguete
Cathedral
Church,
Dumaguete
City
Perdices St.,
Dumaguete
City
Hibbard
Ave.,
Dumaguete
City
Teves St.,
Dumaguete
City
Latitude
Longitude
Crime
9.316222
123.311561
Theft
9.306021
123.300931
Robbery
9.306738
123.302782
Carnapping
9.305142
123.300741
Theft
9.305889
123.3081
Carnapping
9.313096
123.294858
Carnapping
9.30684
123.305447
Robbery
9.306428
123.307671
Theft
9.316837
123.307224
Theft
9.309864
123.303544
Theft
Preparing the base map data

Base map data such as administrative boundaries and street
networks are needed in mapping crimes. The GADM website is an excellent
source of high resolution maps of administrative boundaries. However, for
ease of download the areal map of Dumaguete City was downloaded from
the Philippine GIS Data Clearinghouse (PhilGIS; http://philgis.org/).
PhilGIS is a non-profit, non-governmental repository of free GIS data for
the Philippines. Its data include GIS maps of administrative boundaries of
cities up to the Barangay level (the lowest level of administrative division
in the country). Most of these maps were retrieved by PhilGIS volunteers
from GADM. Street networks of the city were obtained from the
OpenStreetMap. However, one can also use the Google Map Street Layer
as the base layer. This can be accessed through the use of the OpenLayers
plug-in, which can be installed in QGIS. Figure 2 shows the base map of
Dumaguete City. The city is the capital of the Province of Negros Oriental
in central Philippines. Most of the provincial government offices, large
157
universities and schools, and businesses are located in the city,

specifically in or near the central business district (CBD).
Figure 2. Basemap of Dumaguete City.

Crime mapping exercise
Crime mapping proceeds with several steps (Eck et al., 2005). First,
there is a need to have a feel of the spatial distribution of crimes through
some global statistics such as the mean center and standard deviation
ellipse (SDE) statistics. These statistics are equivalent to the non-spatial
descriptive statistics such as the mean and standard deviation. In this
paper, spatial statistics were performed using the CrimeStat 3.3 program
(see Levine, 2010). Figure 3 shows the mean center and the SDE of
carnapping, robbery, and theft incidents in Dumaguete City, 2010-2012.
The dot points on the maps in Figure 3 represent the mean centers, while
the ellipses represent the standard deviation of all points from the mean
center. The interpretation of these statistics is similar to that of the nonspatial mean and standard deviation. The mean center is located by
finding the centermost crime point on the map by considering all other
points. On the other hand, the SDE represents one standard deviation of
all crime points from the mean center of all crimes.
158
Figure 3. Spatial description of carnapping, robbery, and theft incidents in

Dumaguete City, 2010-2012.
One can compare the spatial description of different crimes by
creating a mash-up of, say, all mean centers or all SDEs. Figure 4 presents
the superimposition of the mean centers and SDEs of the three property
crime types. The mean centers reveal that robbery and theft incidents
tend to have similar distribution, while carnapping incidents are more
concentrated to the northeast of the city. In addition, carnapping
incidents are more clustered than the other two crime types.
Figure 4. Mash-up of the mean centers and standard deviation ellipses of

carnapping (red), robbery (yellow), and theft (purple) incidents in Dumaguete
City, 2010-2012.
.
159
The SDEs provide us the idea that these crimes are somewhat
clustered in space, and that the most clustered among the three types are
carnapping incidents. To see if these patterns are non-random beyond
chance or not, an analyst can use the nearest neighbor index (NNI) or the
Ripleys K routines in CrimeStat. In this paper, the NNI was used. The
results from the NNI routines are presented in Figure 5 which was created
using Excel. An NNI less than one denotes clustering, while more than one
signals random distribution of points across space. As seen, the three
crime types are clustered even up to the 100th nearest neighbor. The NNIs
(1st nearest neighbor only) are significant at the 0.0001 level. This means
that crime hot spots exist in the current data, thereby warranting hot spot
mapping.
Nearest Neighbor Index
1.2
1
0.8
0.6
Carnapping NNI
Robbery
0.4
Theft
0.2
0
1
13 19 25 31 37 43 49 55 61 67 73 79 85 91 97
Order of Nearest Neighbor Index
Figure 5. K-order nearest neighbor indices of carnapping, robbery, and theft

incidents in Dumaguete City, 2010-2012. NNIs (1st nearest neighbor only)
are all significant at the 0.0001 level.
There are many techniques in visualizing crime hot spots such as
the point mapping, areal mapping, STAC, and the kernel density
estimation (KDE; Eck et al., 2005). In their study, Chainey et al. (2008)
found that KDE hot spot mapping outperformed other hot spot techniques
in terms of predicting future locations of crime occurrences. Thus, KDE
routine in CrimeStat was used in the current analysis in visualizing crime
hot spots. In producing KDE maps, an analyst defines the bandwidth
arbitrarily. To reduce arbitrariness, the suggestion of Williamson et al.
(1999) and Chainey (2005) to use K-Orders of Nearest Neighbor Index in
defining the bandwidth of smoothing crime points was followed. Figure 6
presents the KDE maps of carnapping, robbery, and theft incidents in the
city.
160
Figure 6. Hot spot maps of carnapping, robbery, and theft incidents in

Dumaguete City, 2010-2012. Incident points = 125 (Carnapping), 308
(Robbery), and 477 (Theft); Measurement type = Direct; Type of calculation
= Absolute densities; Bandwidth = K-Order of 5 (286m) for carnapping, KOrder of 8 (254m) for robbery, and K-Order of 10 (255m) for theft;
Classification scheme = Natural breaks (Jenks).
As seen from Figure 6, the three crime types have different hot spot
distributions. Hot spots of carnapping incidents tend to concentrate within
and outside the central business district (CBD), but still within the
immediate proximity of the CBD. In contrast, robbery hot spots are absent
from the CBD; instead, they are scattered outside to the north, west, and
southwest of the CBD. Finally, most theft incidents cluster within the
CBD. These patterns imply that property crimes are non-randomly
distributed as evidenced by the small number of hot spots compared to
cold spots in the city. It would, then, be fair to speculate that these crimes
may be driven by the ample opportunity provided by the cluster of likely
targets within the city (see Felson & Clarke, 1998; Wortley & Mazerolle,
2008 for the opportunity perspective on crime occurrences).
Overall, this case study successfully demonstrates that the crime
mapping approach introduced in this paper is feasible. One can produce
maps using easy-to-use and free-of-cost tools.
Limitations of the Approach
However, despite the immense potential of the approach introduced
in this paper, several issues remain to be addressed. There is no guarantee
that this technological approach alone can produce beneficial effects to
crime prevention and control. As what Kim and de Guzman (2012)
asserted, human factor (i.e. researchers and analysts) still plays a major
161
role in crime mapping and crime analysis. They argued that the utility of
crime maps largely depends on whether or not the analyst have considered
several factors before creating maps using GIS. These factors include: (1)
what hot spot analysis method to use; (2) when to say a place a hot spot;
(3) how large a hot spot is; and, (4) how hot spots vary across time. Thus,
the methods explicated in this paper requires an analyst who has a good
grasp of the limitations of GIS mapping and of the ways to overcome these
limitations.
There is no guarantee that this approach would be adopted by all
police departments. Chamard (2006) posits that those small departments
in New Jersey, USA that have no prior computerized crime mapping
experience tend to discontinue their use of computerized crime mapping.
Reasons include the unavailability of data, personnel, and other resources.
In terms of the availability of the data, since this approach depends on the
availability of volunteered geographic information (VGI), it may work in
some jurisdictions but not in others. As observed, municipalities in the
Philippines that are composed mostly of rural barangays have incomplete
digital road networks and other VGI. These information are used for
computerized geocoding of crimes. Thus, police departments in these
jurisdictions may resort to manual geocoding, which is more tedious and
time consuming. However, the small number of crimes in these
jurisdictions may offset these issues, but the actual response of police
departments to these concern is yet to be seen.
One final issue that should be pointed out is the concern about the
quality of VGI resources used as base layers (e.g. OpenStreetMap road
layer) for the crime maps and as reference layer in geocoding crime
incidents. Volunteered geographic information are produced and
monitored by millions of volunteers (Goodchild, 2007). Because of this,
some issues related to the quality of VGI exist (Flanagin & Metzger, 2008).
These issues include the credibility of the volunteers, who are mostly
inexperienced and not educated in the science of geography, and the
quality of data which come from millions of volunteers who may have
submitted disparate data, thereby creating problems in arriving an
agreement on what data are exact. Thus, it is important to assure the
quality of these resources (Goodchild & Li, 2012). In terms of quality,
however, VGI do have advantages over authoritative data collected by
governments and private corporations. As Goodchild and Li (2012:112)
argue, authoritative data are increasingly out of date . . . and were
acquired using older technologies that were less accurate than those
available to the general public today . . . Thus in many circumstances it is
easy to show that VGI is of better quality than the best available
authoritative data.
162
Although this free and open source geographical information system

approach to mapping crimes offers some promises, the fulfillment of these
promises are yet to be seen until it is tried by police departments.
Conclusion
In this study, it is argued that the complex and commercial nature
of proprietary GIS and related tools seem to hamper the diffusion of
computerized crime mapping to ill-budgeted police departments,
especially in developing countries. This problem, however, can be solved
through the use of powerful, free and open source GIS (e.g. QGIS). This
GIS is capable of handling, visualizing, and editing spatial crime data.
Moreover, spatial statistics routines of crime data were easily performed,
in conjunction with QGIS, through the use of available free spatial
statistics software like CrimeStat. The viability of using FOS desktop GIS
and related tools was successfully demonstrated through the analysis of
carnapping, robbery, and theft incidents in Dumaguete City.
It is, therefore recommended that police departments in the
Philippines invest in the adoption of the approach explicated in this paper.
A good start would be conducting GIS crime mapping training with nonuniformed personnel in the Philippine National Police using the said
approach. If the personnel are already capable, then the purchase of
needed hardware may follow. With the use of free-of-cost programs, police
departments would be enabled to do more with less.
163
LESSON 8.2 EXERCISES

Name: ________________________________ Date: ___________ Grade: _______
1. Surf the internet and look for this article: Bomb threats and reports of
suspicious items in the Philippines: Spatial and temporal patterns.
Summarize the results and identify and describe the open source GIS
materials used to derive the results.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
2. Look for another research that uses open source GIS materials. In a
separate sheet, summarize the results and identify and describe the GIS
materials used to derive the results.
164
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NORSU ETEEAP MODULE

Dan Jerome S. Barrera, MSCJ

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Introduction to Research Design

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

After reading this lesson, you shall be able to:

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

effectiveness of the interventions he/she has devised. All of these activities

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

when you are told by your instructor to do research in the library

when you ask permission from your parents to go to your

The term research that you usually use in these situations

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

In this course, we shall use the following short definition:

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

to lower crimes and improved community perceptions. They had no

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

whether bomb threats are non-random and tend to concentrate in

a police investigator building a case against an individual

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

a prosecutor who argues in court that there is probable cause

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Idiographic explanations Nomothetic explanations

Quantitative research Qualitative research

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

What are the approaches in research?

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Idiographic and nomothetic research differ in terms of the number

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

ethnography and other qualitative research from which words from

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

enumerate and discuss the purposes of research;

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

who or what he/she is going to explore, describe, or whose actions he/she

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

What is common in these examples is that the researcher usually

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

makers and researchers must evaluate the effectiveness of criminal justice

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Here are some common units of analysis in criminology and criminal

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

(sociological reductionism). Also, some researchers focus solely on one unit

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

2030. Note that by generating another sample of 500 children, it is not

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Note, however, that none of these methods is superior to another

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

Secondary data analysis

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

To measure the effects of the experiment they gathered data (before,

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE

is exploratory, description, explanation, or evaluation. We also decide

NORSU CRIMINOLOGICAL RESEARCH AND STATISTICS MODULE