Measuring Crime

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In order to measure crime, one must first identify the unit of analysis who (offender) committed the offenses, victim, then identify the types of crimes committed and incident. Each method provides the researcher with its own unique measurements. Each of the three methods has its own unique strengths and weaknesses, which must be identified in order to gain an accurate picture. The three methods of measuring crime are official statistics, victim surveys, and self-report surveys.

The first method is official statistics, information gathered on offenders, offenses, and judicial outcomes that are produced and reported by the law enforcement agencies. There are numerous sources of official crime statistics that these agencies rely upon those being the Uniform Crime Reports (UCR), and National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS). This method relies on crimes reported to police agencies and describes the unique data of those arrested. The downside of this method is that it only shows crimes, that are reported to and recorded by the official agencies. Our studies have taught us that we know that individuals are less likely to report a ‘crime’ to police if they regard it as a private matter between friends and family; …show more content…
Victim surveys utilize sampling of the population either nationally or locally and are asked which crimes have been committed against them over a certain period of time. The strength of this method is it overcomes the fact that the police don’t record a significant proportion of offenses. It gives an excellent picture of the extent and patterns of victimization which is something completely missing from official accounts. Like the other methods victim surveys also have weaknesses, most notable are basing statistics on victims’ memories that can either be faulty or biased. This method also omits crimes like business crime (fraud, embezzlement), etc., or where a victim may be unaware of or unable to report the
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