Research Methods in Criminal Justice and Relevant Terminologies

The investigation of crime, society’s reaction to it and approaches to prevent it are all areas that have interested me from my adolescent years. I have an interest and passion for Criminology studies for the strict purpose of wanting to fulfill a deeper understanding of the causes and consequences of crime and exploring how crimes affect our society. This shady interest in the criminal world has encouraged me to pursue the subject at degree level and to seriously consider a career in a related field. At the beginning of the course my understanding on crime and criminology was mostly derived from the internet or media. These tools became very useful for me to learn different subjects of crime.

To begin with, statistics can be defined as the practice or science of collecting and analyzing numerical data in large quantities, especially for the purpose of inferring proportions in a whole from those in a representative sample. Criminal justice on the other hand is defined as the system of practices and institutions of governments directed at upholding social control, deterring and mitigating crime, or sanctioning those who violate laws with criminal penalties and rehabilitation efforts. The use of statistics has been around for decades in a number of scholarly disciplines. More specifically, it has been an important vehicle in obtaining better knowledge in the field of criminal justice. This paper will discuss the role of statistics in criminal justice.

By constructing theories or representations we can increase our understanding of criminal conduct. Through improving our understanding we can create effective, and operational strategies to handle crime issues. We must have a sufficient amount of accurate and documented research, and or experiments to prove the validity of our research. Research is attaining the information and data needed to generate a theory. We gather research by creating specific controlled experiments to reach a conclusion that will satisfy, or otherwise attest our theories.

In the article entitled “Criminologists Should Stop Whining About Their Impact on Policy and Practice,” Wellford (2010) argued that criminologists should celebrate the influences criminology, as a discipline, has made thus far on policy and practice, rather than focusing on having a greater impact. Wellford (2010) examined two essential proportions on this issue, policies influenced by research and research influences policy.

Schmalleger, F. (2012). Criminology Today: An Integrative Introduction (6th ed.). Retrieved from The University of Phoenix eBook Collection Database

Fred is drunk and driving his dad’s car. Fred is a 21 year old student at Columbia College. Fred rams into a parked car at 10th and Rogers. Thinking no one saw him; Fred moves his car and parks it on an adjacent lot. He sprints to his dorm room in Miller Hall. A neighbor saw the wreck and Fred running to the dorm. Police are called and they arrive ten minutes after the wreck. The officers see several empty beer cans and a bottle of tequila (half full) in the front seat. The tags are traced to Fred’s dad, who is called by police. Dad says that Fred is a student at Columbia College. Police run Fred's record and determine that he has two prior DWIs within the past five years. The third DWI in 10 years is a felony. Police contact

Increasing the role of evaluation and research in criminal justice policy would require a multifaceted approach and the cooperation of policymakers and criminal justice agencies. First jurisdictions would be required to assess their current crime problems to determine their need for certain policies. Then agencies need to be required to allocate a certain amount of their budget to evaluation of their current policies. A major hindrance in evaluating policy is the lack of resources to do so. If agencies were federally mandated to spend a certain amount of funding on evaluation and research then it is possible that policymakers could create more informed and effective policy. In addition a certain amount of funding would also have to be allocated to full implementation of polices. When policies rooted in theory are created they are expected to be successful, but they often falter due to their incorrect or lack of implementation (Mears, 2007). Although increasing the amount of funds spent on research and evaluation may seem problematic it has the potential to help avoid the

Criminal justice degree programs start with advanced overviews of the operation and organization criminal justice systems. Students learn about the purposes and functions of these system in apprehending, prosecuting, punishing and rehabilitating offenders. Historical and current theories of criminal behavior, such as comparative criminology, are explored. This will include theories about the biological and sociological roots of criminal behaviors. Crime categories are introduced, such as drug, organized and white-collar crimes. Students study crime measurements through statistics, research and analysis of social trends. Coursework covers criminal law and procedures, such

In this paper you will learn the process of research. Anyone can research but in order to research correctly, one must know the language and process. As always when researching the reason one is researching to find new information. This is when one will familiarize their self with new research terminology as well as knowledge. When one describes the research process it should contain; the new terminology found, how the terminology and knowledge apply to the research, explain how not knowing the proper terminology can affect the research and as well as why knowing the correct terminology helps. When researching one must

As a criminal justice and psychology major, my primary experience has involved extensive research related to both fields. Specifically, my research experience has involved independent and collaborative work in designing and conducting different types of research projects that adheres to research method procedures and ethics. Through my studies, I have also attained knowledge regarding the structure of the correctional system, with

It is human nature to want to completely understand why and how a specific situation occurs. Humans are always trying to find ways to collect data on these circumstances to the fullest potential. IN the criminal justice field they have tried a multiple of different studies and surveys to collect their data. Two of these methods are the self report survey and the collection of information through official crime reports. Some of these methods are better than others allowing for a more accurate collection of data.

Gathering data and researching material is very important within the criminal justice system. No matter what profession one may have within the judicial system, researching information is something that has to be done at one time or another. Within this paper I plan on discussing what I’ve learned about research for criminal justice and its criteria. Emphases of this paper are to give some informational data on police officers and why they choose protecting the community a profession.

In a study done by Mustaine and Tweksbury (1998), over a thousand college students in criminal justice/sociology courses in

When thinking about Criminal Justice it’s obvious that research is involved in solving crime. But it goes much further than that. Research is actually conducted in Criminal Justice itself. Research is done in Criminal Justice for a number of reasons. Research can be conducted in Criminal Justice for three main reasons; social problems, policy and academics. Then a number of other additional reasons are exploration, description, explanation, application, predictive and finally intervening. Within why research is conducted is another important aspect of Criminal Justice is Methodology; which is how the research is being conducted. Each of these topics will further be explained in depth.

This personal case study will be giving a brief summary on the key aspects of research that I believe will have the greatest influence on my future career as a Law Enforcement Officer, wishing to study the minds of juveniles and how to reduce the recidivism rate before they become an adult. The key components that I learned about research which I will be discussing are, formulating a research question, generating hypothesis, and threats to internal validity.