official sources of crime data: collected by govt and govt agencies

unofficial sources of crime data: collected by private or independent agencies / researchers

positivist criminology: collection of data about people follows the same scientific procedures as data in science

• not a perfect view because data doesn’t speak for itself

uniform crime records: compiled each yr in washington dc by fbi staticians

• most reliable set of crime data

• provides diverse info for 4 violent crimes and 4 property crimes

• provides data about arrest trends by location

National Incident-Based Reporting System: FBI-coordinated supplementary reporting system

Evaluation of the UCR

• does commendable job, could do better w more sophisticated methodology

• because of inherent biases, UCR can’t accurately measure crime rate

• a large number of crimes go unreported ➝ can’t show up in UCR

• police participation in UCR is voluntary

• UCR doesn’t include federal crimes

Criminologists have turned to victimization surveys to understand volume and rate of crime

• examine representative samples of a pop to discover what crimes have been experienced in a given period

Unofficial sources of crime data

• self-report data

• life-course data - official crime data, self-reports, psych evals, iq tests

• life-history data - lived experiences of individuals

• criminal biographies

• observation research and participant observation research

• comparative and historical research