Develop a research question with two major concepts. Operationalize these concepts and discuss how you would measure them. First, you should discuss how you would measure each variable using NOIR as discussed in Chapter 5. Then, using this, expand your measurements to include each unit of measurement discussed in Chapter 4. Discuss clearly what type of questions you would ask to obtain your measure and be sure to clearly discuss your research question. For example, if my research question is “how do drugs impact violent crime rates” I could say that I would measure individual drug use by counting the number of times a person smokes a day (which is the individual and IR levels) and I could say this impact the type of violence used by these individuals in the categories of use of gun, fighting, or slapping (individual and nominal). I could say I would measure the percent of drug users in a neighborhood (group and IR) and violent crime in a neighborhood and rate the level of violence by mid, high, and extreme (group level and ordinal).
Los Angeles police consider a murder to be gang related if either the victim or the offender is known to be a gang member, whereas Chicago police record a murder as gang related only if the killing is directly related to gang activities (Spergel, 1990). Describe how these different operational definitions illustrate general points about measuring crime discussed in this chapter.
Measuring gang-related crime is an example of trying to measure a particular dimension of crime: motive. Other examples are hate crimes, terrorist incidents, and drug-related crimes. Specify conceptual and operational definitions for at least one of these types. Find one mass or social media story and one research report that present an example.
How would you measure crime in a specific city if you wanted to evaluate a community policing program that encourages neighborhood residents to report incidents to police.
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Create a research question that incorporates two major concepts. Put these ideas into practice and talk about how you’d measure them. First, as discussed in Chapter 5, discuss how you would measure each variable using NOIR. Then, using this as a starting point, expand your measurements to include each unit of measurement mentioned in Chapter 4. Discuss the types of questions you’ll ask to obtain your measure in detail, and be sure to include your research question. For example, if my research question is “how do drugs impact violent crime rates,” I could say that I would measure individual drug use by counting the number of times a person smokes per day (at both the individual and IR levels), and that this would influence the type of violence.
