CRIM 220 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Grounded Theory, Operationalization, Motor Vehicle Theft
7 Jun 2018
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Crim 220: NOTES
LECTURE 1, Week 1: Course Overview Tuesday, January 9th
Midterm on Week 5 (February 6th): based on the material on the first 4 chapters
-Recall questions and recognition (Chapters 1,2,4,5, bit of 6)
Final Exam: Cumulative, weighted heavily on post-midterm material
-Will also be based on assigned readings
Main Ethical Principle: Do no harm
Research Project (part 1)
-1500-2000 words
-Write an introduction for your research proposal that explains and presents your topic
-Write background literature review including 5 academic articles
-Propose 2 possible research designs to answer your research question
-Include APA-formatted reference list (loose half a point for every error on referencing)
Research Project (part 2)
-4,000-5,000 words
-Strict guidelines in terms of format and content
-Communication style matters
-Example paper will be provided on Canvas
LECTURE 2, Week 2: Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 Tuesday, January 16th
Crim 220 Chapter 1: Crime, Criminal Justice, and Scientific Inquiry
Why study Research Methods?
• CJ professionals are both consumers and producers of research
• It is important for CJ professionals to be informed consumers of research
• Need to understand findings and how to apply those findings to his or her department
Two Realities
•Experiential Reality: things we know from direct experience (e.g. touching a hot stove)
•Agreement Reality: things we consider real because we are told they are real, and
everyone agrees upon this. Much of the stuff we deal with, especially social issues.
(e.g. controversies of global warming- are humans responsible for it?)
•Example: Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment (revealed the agreement between
reality that simply increasing patrols decreased crime was misleading)
The Role of Science: an approach to an agreement between both
realities. Assertions are logical and empirical (scientist have a certain criteria
to be met).
1
Personal Human Inquiry
• Future circumstances are caused or conditioned by present ones
•We use causal and probabilistic reasoning
• Partly linked to what we learn about the world
• Everybody is a naive observer (not always looking at it from a scientific way)
• Complemented by two sources of secondhand knowledge— tradition and authority
Tradition: Born into firmly accepted knowledge about the workings of the
world within our culture. Test some; accept the great majority. Can give a
clear saving advantage, however it can also hinder human inquiry.
Authority: the acceptance of new knowledge depends on the status of
the discoverer. Can both help and hinder human inquiry, however experts
can be wrong.
• Tradition and authority are double-edged swords, so critical thinking is important
• These elements provide us with a starting point for personal inquiry, but can lead to
a wrong point or direction.
Errors in Human Personal Inquiry- how it can go wrong?
Inaccurate Observations
Failure to observe things that are right infant of
us, and often observing that aren’t so.
Solution: use scientific observation with
accurate tools and measurements.
Overgeneralization
Assuming that a few similar events are
evidence of a general pattern.
Solution: using appropriate (large) sample and
replication.
Selective Observation
Can be caused by overgeneralization, where
only the future events and situations related to
an identified pattern are observed— and
others are ignored.
Solution: specify number, type of observations
Illogical Reasoning
Methods of handling observations that
contradict people’s judgements about the
way things are; e.g. ‘the exception that
proves the rule’, and ‘gambler’s fallacy’.
Solution: create logical arguments
2
Empirical Knowledge- the production of knowledge based on experience and
observations.
Methodology- how social science methods can be used to better understand
crime and criminal justice problems (science of finding out).
Epistemology- the science of knowing
• Social scientific inquiry is conscious, and it is a much more careful process than our
personal inquiry
• However the social scientific inquiry does not offer total protection against errors
that people commit in personal inquiry
How to Design a Research Project
The Research Process
Offers several possible beginnings, either:
- An initial interest which might lead to an idea, which may fit within a larger
theory, and the theory may produce new interests and new ideas
-The understanding of a theory may lead to considering new policies
Getting Started (Idea/ Theory)
-Get informed, read something about the issue Might involve looking at
previous research on the topic
-Talk to people that are involved or aware of the issue at hand
Ideology and Politics
Ideological or political views on criminal issues
(e.g. racial bias in police practice and
sentencing, tough sentences on sex offenders,
etc.) can undermine the objectivity in the
research progress.
Solution: approach research without bias
Errors in Human Personal Inquiry- how it can go wrong?
3
Exploration
Exploring a specific problem. Usually involve
collecting data on some measure to
establish a baseline with which future
changes will be compared.
-Can be adequate for policy
change
-Can be simple or complex,
using a variety of methods
Description
Describe the scope of the crime problem or
policy responses to a problem. Descriptive
research involves observing and the
describing what is observed. Focus
more on developing a preliminary
understanding of a new or
unusual problem.
- Can have many different uses
Explanation
Explaining things. Considers the ‘why’
behind issues.
Application
Applied research comes from the need for
specific facts and findings with policy
implications. There are two types
-Evaluation: used to evaluate the effects of
specific criminal justice programs. Mostly tests the
results of a program or policy change.
-Problem Analysis: of general justice policies and more
specific problem. Focuses primarily in future events,
and also increasingly used to devise appropriate
responses
Purposes of Research
Not mutually exclusive
Document Summary
Midterm on week 5 (february 6th): based on the material on the first 4 chapters. Recall questions and recognition (chapters 1,2,4,5, bit of 6) Final exam: cumulative, weighted heavily on post-midterm material. Will also be based on assigned readings. Write an introduction for your research proposal that explains and presents your topic. Write background literature review including 5 academic articles. Propose 2 possible research designs to answer your research question. Include apa-formatted reference list (loose half a point for every error on referencing) Strict guidelines in terms of format and content. Example paper will be provided on canvas. Lecture 2, week 2: chapter 1 and chapter 2. Crim 220 chapter 1: crime, criminal justice, and scientific inquiry. Two realities: experiential reality: things we know from direct experience (e. g. touching a hot stove, agreement reality: things we consider real because we are told they are real, and everyone agrees upon this.
