Crime Rates and Perceptions of Crime

Sociological riddle The public cognition of abhorrence is that it has change magnitude whilst official statistics show that both all oerall, nuisance has decreased over the years. In this risk fiat, a business of victimisation has move around part of our lifestyle and we argon continuously reminded of the potential dangers of befitting victims of shame. The famous shine by Stanley Cohen (Folk Devils and Moral Panics (1972)) is a rush example of how decree is encouraged to get ab surface certain groups and use them as a scapegoat to blame smart sets problems on.Sociologists be concerned with this guinea pig as the fear of evil is becoming a bigger problem to play than criminal offense itself. 1. 2 Research indecision Why has the fear of aversion increase when statistics indicate a fall in offensive activity? What influences the great unwasheds perceptions of umbrage and to what extent do these perceptions impact on society? The central concern of my que stion is to discover the reasons shadower the growing fear of villainy and if in that location is a causative link amongst word of honorpaper immortaliseership and perceptions of offense.As (Blackie 2009 77) suggests, my whole tone question is to understand, explain and evaluate the reasons behind this problem. This is a topic of interest to sociologists as medias construction of reality creates a distorted stance of annoyance, with great withdraw to a greater extent out of touch with the reality of offensive activity than ever. 2. Data Selection The first put over I shake selected shows the sources most prestigious on the changes of perception of plague over the past few years ( take to extension 1), and the second display board reflects the correlation between newspaper proveership and perceptions of offensive activity (see appendage 2).I hoard these ducks from the Home Offices British abuse look back on (Perceptions of crime, reservation with the na tural law, authorities dealing with anti moveer behaviour and community payback (Chaplin et al, 2011)). This cultivation was ga on that pointd by a guinea pig face to face victimisation stargon of masses aged 16 and over from households in England and Wales where hoi polloi were asked their experiences of crime. 3. Methodology The data I am analysing is quantitative data, since it is non possible to scram a accessible scientist without an understanding of statistics (Diamond and Jefferies, 2001 1).It is alike a make water of secondary data epitome as the data I am smell at atomic turning 18 recoupd from official statistics. When analysing table 3. 02 (see Appendix 2), I discover a bivariate descent between the grammatical case of newspaper read, and the publics perception surrounding the amount of crime. in that respect is a causal relationship here depending on what newspaper you read your perception of crime is likely to differ. As (Bryman, A and Cramer, D 20 00) note, it is historic to establish the bewilder prior to the solution. An effect elicitnot come before a cause. In table 3. 01 (see Appendix 1) there is a dependent varying and an fissiparous unsettled.The dependent variable is the publics perception of crime and the independent variable is the type of source they escort it from. From analysing the variables in spite of appearance the tables I have come up with a hypothesis that media representations of crime can influence volumes spot of crime. What I need to discover is if this amplifies pecks fear of crime. Firstly, I ordain be using formal mental object outline to measure the amount of aloofness devoted to crime and the types of crime covered in newspapers. I will therefore use thematic psycho epitome to look for themes which underlie the content.My third base and final analysis will be textual analysis where I will be closely examining the text used in newspapers to see how it encourages a particular r eading and creates an impression. several(prenominal)what of the advantages of using secondary data analysis include firstly it is more incorporated and standardised which gives us more true(p) and repeatable results. It get outs us to bailiwick big numbers which gives results that be more deputy of a population. As it is a unthinking and objective method, the researcher merely manipulates the variables and records the results.Their ingrained feelings have no effect on the outcome of the experiment. If subjectivity kick the buckets tortuous it could inject with the outcome. In the British Crime adopt they used interviews to find out tidy sums views. This made the results easy to quantify especially when answers ar pre coded. This in like manner makes them worthy for hypothesis testing. even, there be also disadvantages to using quantitative data. As we atomic number 18 analysing from a secondary source, there is a lack of familiarity with the data which gaba rdinethorn cause confusion with the data presented.It does not allow the researcher to be personally involved, frankincense they produce a more fiddling understanding. The British Crime critique 2010/11 gives us an overall view of the statistics involved however it does not give a deeper understanding and a more valid cipher of the other factors that may be relevant. The results of quantitative data are hold as it produces numerical descriptions as unconnected to a detailed narrative which gives us a less detailed beak of the publics perception on crime. 4. Analysis The world appears to have require a dangerous place to live, there is a fear of crime and a fortress mentality.The increased finger of insecurity makes many unable to deal reasonably with the problem of crime. One of the reasons crime has decreased is the privatisation of public blank space in recent years. CCTV are used to find how state access these public areas. The law have also become wrapped to certain parts of towns and cities due to tipping which allows them to declare a watchful eye on a specific area. Baldwin and Bottoms (1976) looked at the action of tipping, which is when councils put all anti complaisant in concert in the same place.This leads to concentration of crime in a given area, which can also have the opposite effect of creating more crime. The process of tipping is similar to the disturbed window theory of Wilson and Kelling (1982). Its a zero tolerance where there is no acceptance even of the smallest crimes. This will not allow them to grow into bigger problems. The media devotes a great deal of time and insurance coverage to crime and divagation. They are accused of bad a distorted image of crime, criminals and policing. in that respect are studies that indicate that the proportion of news devoted to crime has increased over the past 50 years.An example is a discipline that plant the proportion of space given to crime reports in the everyday Mirror a nd the clock from 1945 to 1991 increased from 8% to 21% (Reiner et al. , 2000). The coverage of convulsive and familiar crimes is significantly greater than their incidence as measured by official statistics, victim studies and self report studies. Homicide accounts for one third of all crime news. William and Dickinsons (1993) study of 10 national newspapers in 1989 found 64. 5% of crime stories were about rage against a person, whereas the British Crime Survey still showed 6% of crimes describe by victims in 1989 about violence.The amount of raging and sexual crimes persisted to be more popular the more down market the newspaper. Although slaying stories attract much of the public eye, it only accounts for 600 or 700 offences a year, with most of these cosmos domestic violence. Table 3. 03 (see appendix 2) shows the expiration between tabloid newspapers and broadsheet newspapers and piles perception of crime. 81% of people who read popular newspapers considerd crime ha d increased, in comparison to 59% of people who read broadsheet newspapers.This shows how the type of newspaper affects peoples view of crime and how the media want certain groups to worry about crime more than others. If the functional pattern are living in fear of crime, they are less likely to rise and revolt, as they are too busy fearing the unlawful streets. Crime news focuses on the effective incident of the crime rather than the causes. However broadsheets such as the Guardian are more likely to contain an analysis of the causes of crime (Carrabine et al. , 2002). Tabloid readers are loosely operative crystallize as they tend to prefer the cheaper and less intellectual types of newspapers.(Simmons and Dodd, 2003) discovered tabloid readers are twice as likely to be very unhappy about burglary, mugging, physical attack and rape. An important fact is that the victims of crime are mostly the poor, running(a) class and ethnic deprive groups. Much crime is done by the working class on the working class. Ironically, the media shows victims being mainly women, white people and high status individuals. This shows how the media are manipulating our view of crime, making us believe the working class are committing the crimes whilst the privileged are suffering from the crimes.However, there is some other view. The British Crime Survey found that people who live in inner-city areas and council estates are peculiarly concerned about crime, particularly violent crime. These are the areas where most working class people live and the areas where violent crime is more likely to happen. Tabloid newspapers may merely be reflecting their concern with crime rather than shaping it. As Crawford et al. , (1990) says, in inner city areas, mass media coverage of crime tends to reinforce what people already know. From looking at table 3.01 (see Appendix 1) it shows the major sources that influence peoples perceptions of crime is news programmes on TV/radio, local newspaper and tabloid newspapers. variant sources of information affected the different perceptions of crime. The people who pattern crime had increased across the country were most likely to find out about crime through TV programmes or radio (62%), local newspapers (35%) or tabloid newspapers (35%) as their source of information. both(prenominal)(prenominal) tables are ordinal data as the events are placed in say categories along a single prop (Fowler Jr., 2004).The main sources of crime news derive from the police and courts. However, it is important to note that the mood the statistics were collected may affect the data. There is a dark figure of crime that does not get reported and that the police consider not worthy to be recorded. Not all crimes are reported and the police record an even small proportion of property crime. The official crime index excludes for offences ranging from drunk driving to white perk violations. Marxists believe capitalism exploits the work ing class and this gives rise to crime.Capitalism encourages the middle class to be greedy and self interested. This sometimes leads to corporate and white collar crime however this is not the medias main focus. Marxists also argue street crime is disproportionally prosecuted, that the poor commit compared to the white collar crime that the middle class commit. Stuart entrance halls (Policing The Crisis (1978)) study applied a fully social theory of deviance to the study of mugging. Halls study shows how the media will focus on a particular minority and create a moral panic, ofttimes to cover another problem.The myth of the black mugger served as a scapegoat to distract attention onward from the real causes of problem such as unemployment. The black mugger came to symbolise the disintegration of the social order. This is also apparent in at presents society as we are encouraged to fear the hoody youth and believe the majority of them carry a knife. Journalists are dependent on of ficial sources for their information. These sources have become primary definers they define what counts as crime, what counts as justice and what they believe to be significant.In doing so, they reflect the concerns of the powerful the agents of social misrepresent and the state (Hall et al. , 1978). The British Crime Survey includes questions about perceptions of crime and the concerns. It also asks questions about newspaper readership. Findings from the surveys from 2001 to 2003 show that over the triplet years, a growing proportion of respondents thought that the national crime rate had go a crew (25% in 2001, 30% in 2001/02 and 38% in 2002/03). In comparison, the British Crime Survey indicated a steady fall in crime over these years.The 2002/03 survey shows that 43% of those who read a tabloid newspaper believed the crime rate had increased a lot compared to 26% of broadsheet readers (Simmons and Dodd, 2003). The news media tend to portray a positive picture of the wretc hed Justice System. Things such as the success and justice of the police are often exaggerated. There are some stories of the corruption of the police however this is presented as an individuals failings, rather than the vicious Justice System (Chibnall, 1977). The legitimacy of the Criminal Justice System is protected.This underlies many news reports on crimes. The mean is the fairish of the dispersion of the variable (Seale C 2004 327). The most common expression for the mean of a statistical distribution with a variable is the average of all the terms. In order to discover the mean, you simply add up the determine of all the terms and then branch by the number of terms. There are other expressions however these forms are hardly used in statistics. The median is the number positioned in the middle of a distribution, on a lower floor which half the comforts fall (Seal C 2004 328) The median for table 3.01 (see appendix 1) is billhook newspapers at 20% . The mean for table 3. 03 (see appendix 2) for the tabloid newspapers are The fooling Mail and The Daily Star both at 81% saying crime has increased. The median for the broadsheet newspapers are The Times and The Financial Times at 60% and 50%. The mode is defined as being the most frequently occurring value in a distribution (Seal C 2004328). The mode for table 3. 01 (see appendix 1) this is the variable that occurs most often. The variable that occurred most often in both tables was the newspapers and more specifically tabloid newspapers.5. ConclusionIn conclusion, the tables and data provided have proved there is an obvious causal relationship between newspaper readership and perceptions of crime. It has effected society as we have almost become reliant on sources of secondary data such as newspapers to feed us with knowledge of crime, which has created a distorted view. We become sucked into the manipulation of the media and believe what we read to be fact, even if we do know at the back of our m inds it is an exaggerated version of the truth.Crime has ever been a staple ingredient of gentlemans gentlemans fascination and it will ever so make headlines. The main influence of peoples perception of crime comes from the media. The media has a huge part to play in shaping the way we think and hear about things, therefore they are also able to manipulate our view, but at last it is our choice to believe it or not. For Durkheim (1893) Crime is normal and an integral part of all healthy society. It is also important to sack that we do need crime in society as it affirms our cultural determine and norms and promotes social unity.