2B: Definitons, Measurements + Perceptions of Crime Flashcards
(7 cards)
Introduction
In many areas of society, what the facts and statistics show us to be in a situation is often not reflected in the perceptions of what people believe to be the case. This difference between those two points is known as a “perception gap” and the area of crime in no different to many other social issues. In recent years the official crime rate has shown that crime has fallen by 8% in the last 8 years, yet considering the findings of self report or victimisation studies we are shown that people believe the opposite to be true with 60% believing that crime is actually increasing according to the SCJS. It can be argued that crime in society is not as bad as people perceive it to be and that certain factors contribute to this misconception. The media plays a significant part in this due to the way it reports on a range of stories. This essay shall consider the role of the media alongside findings of victimisation studies and the OCR, to prove that crime is definitely not as bad as people perceive it to be. Nevertheless for some it can also be argued that crime is actually as bad as they believe it to be and therefore this shall also be discussed, through the consideration of crime rates on a deeper level which actually indicates a rise in crime to allow a valid conclusion to be reached.
Paragraph 1 part 1
One reason people perceive crime to be worse than it actually is, is due to crime rates, these give information on crime officially recorded by the police and not all recorded crimes where a decision is made not to proceed with charges. 78% of people in England and wales think that crime has gone up in the past few years, but the data on actual crime shows the exact opposite. This shows that crime is largely perceived to be worse than it is. Feminists argue that crime statistics underplay the extent of females as victims, although some statistics show that there has been a decline in specific crimes generally females as victims is still an issue with women being disproportionately affected in specific crimes, particularly domestic violence. The crime survey for England and wales estimated that for people over the age of 16 - 1.4 million women compared to 751,000 men experienced domestic abuse in the year ending March 2023. Similarly in America nearly 1 in 5 compared to 1 in 7 men have been raped in their lifetime. Females are more likely to feel it has gotten worse (73% compared to 79% of males) however there is strong evidence to support that there has been a decrease in car crime and burglary. This shows us that because women are less likely to commit crime, they are more prone to believing it has gotten worse. In addition many female victims of physical and sexual attacks are reluctant to report offences out of fear that no one will believe that the abuse happened meaning statistics may be unrepresentative of the crime that is actually happening and in this case the feminists perception of crime may be true.
Paragraph 1 part 2
It can be said that males commit more crime as 75% of all convictions each year account for males. Comparing this to Scotland where crime has also fallen in the last 15 years as well as people generally feeling safer in their environments. Victims of crime are less likely to believe that there has been improvements (60% compared to 77% non victims). Left realists accept that official statistics have some value and should not be rejected out of hand and therefore would agree that indeed crime is not as bad as people perceive it to be. This can be argued to be true as the OCR does provide statistics however it fails to recognise unreported crimes meaning the OCR may only represent approximately 40% of all crime. The difference between what is recorded and what actually happens is often referred to as the ‘dark side’ of crime statistics, this may mean that while crime stats are accurate they may not be the most reliable due to the lack of representation to actual crimes committed.
Paragraph 1 part 3
In April 2018 a question was introduced on the crime survey for England and wales to ask respondents how likely they are to be a victim of crime in the next 12 months. In the year ending March 2009 1 in 4 people said they thought they were very or fairly likely to be a victim of crime in the next year. Since then there has been a gradual decline to around 1 in 5 people in March 2016. This decline in the perceived likelihood of being a victim of crime corresponds to the overall trend in CSEW crime prevalence which significantly decrease from 23.3% in the year ending March 2009 to 15.2% intense year ending March 2016 proving the age gap is getting better and improving. This highlights that the perception of crime is linked to the level of crime that is occurring and that people often think it is worse than it actually is. Comparing this to the rest of the world in 2022 crime in America is decreasing but according to statistics 78.9% believed it had increased only 13% believed it has decreased. This proves to us that crime in society is not as bad as people perceive it to be and that it is common in many countries to think that the perception of crime is not representative to what the statistics show us however, we still have to take into account the level of underreported crime
Paragraph 2 - the media
Another reason which can help to explain why people perceive crime to be worse than it actually is, is due to the media which can have a very large effect on people’s perception, especially when it comes to crime. The media does this by the sensationalism of its stories this type of journalism encourages biased or emotionally loaded impressions of events amongst readers who often will not have access to all of the information relating to the incident. This can affect the way society thinks as it will manipulate a story in a way that makes it more intriguing to read. This is important as it will lead to people believing in a case which isn’t fully true. We get all our news from the media therefore people’s minds are constantly being bombarded by with all this over exaggerated information which as expected has a lasting effect on the way people think. This leads to many people believing they are more likely to be a victim of crime than they actually are, or that crime is far worse in society than it actually is. According to the office for national statistics, for people ages 35-44 23% of them believed they were likely to be a victim of crime. When in fact only 17% of them has experienced crime in 2016. A similar trend can be seen for people aged 25-34 over 20 believed they were likely to be a victim of crime yet only around 17% were victims. This is important as it shows there is a clear perception gap in our society, In this case England and Wales. Yet this isn’t the case for all age groups as for people ages 16-24 19.1% believed they were likely to be a victim of crime compared to over 20% actually being a victim. This is showing that the perception gap is more prominent in older age groups as a result they clearly think that crime in society is worse than it actually is. Whereas the younger age group cannot be said to have the same wrong impressions. Like in the UK, the America also tend to sensationalise stories to pull in more viewers /readers often they will refrain from reporting about issues from around the world and instead focus on one’s in America itself. An example of this would be a news outlet in Florida reporting about a murder in California and in other areas. This does not necessarily need to be reported in Florida yet it does as it is beneficial for the news company - reporting on things that are ‘big news stories’ attracts far higher viewing ratings and in turn especially through commercial networks, can result in far higher revenues in terms of advertising being brought into the network. The effect this has on a person living in Florida is they believe there is now a problem with crime this can happen as in the media there is usually trends. For a week there may be an influx of murder reports which usually doesn’t always happen. Therefore, this over reporting will influence them people to think this leading to them believing they are more likely to be a victim. These stats show that the media is an incredibly significant factor in impacting societies perception of crime, ultimately leading to the perception gap increasing therefore, more people believe they will be a victim of crime. Even tho the real case is that they are unlikely too
Paragraph 3 - linking paragraph
So far, it has been shown that crime in society is most definitely not as bad as people perceive it to be and that whilst the OCR can show that crime is falling overall, people do not feel that way and this is often fuelled by things such as media reporting. However, there may be some people who would hold an opposing viewpoint and argue that crime in society is at least for certain groups as bad as people perceive it to be. For these people they would argue that some groups in society are likely to suffer from crime as much as they think that they will often being repeat victims of crime and there are also some crime categories where unlike overall crime rates are on the increase. Crime is more likely to recur against the same people and at the same places meaning that local govts should keep on top of their local crime hotspots such as bars and clubs. This means victims of crime are likely to undermine the governments attempt to tackle crime as it has happened to them multiple times creating a poor perspective of crime. Levels of crime are higher in more deprived areas and different populations have a different likelihood of living in more deprived areas
Paragraph 4 - poverty
People living in poverty are more likely to turn to criminal activities as a means of survival, meaning the perception that crime is increasing a,mobster deprived individuals can be true and therefore crime for them is as bad as they think it is. Linking this to the rest of the world in South Africa crime is consistently noted as a concern for South Africans but it consistently ranks as one of the worlds most dangerous countries. It is ranked 10th worst overall in violence reduction and 19th worst in terms of safety and security in global peace index. In this case there is not much of a perception gap as the publics concerns match what the statistics show. In addition, increasing levels of both fraud and CMA offences (up7% and 53% respectively). When considering the perception of these crimes most respondents thought that the government were not doing enough to tackle fraud and that they were not likely to catch those committing fraud. In 2022 61% of respondents had this view compared with 54% in 2016, this is another case where the specific type of crime meets the perceptions of the public. So, we can say that generally there is a large perception gap amongst people in the uk’s views compared to what the statistics show us however as discussed above there are some exceptions and these specific crimes are more likely to meet the publics expectations.
