One method of collecting data is via the victimisation surveys and a positive thing about then is that they include crimes that are not reported to the police, these are collected by the home office. Victim surveys are anonymous and ask details of crimes committed against the individuals and the most significant of them is the British Crime Survey (BCS). BCS has been positively evaluated for showing a true picture of crime because it was found that only 44% of the crimes were actually reported in 1997 and 97% of them were property crimes, this supports the statement earlier that the ruling-classes set laws which protect their materialistic possessions. Also of those 44%, 46% of the crimes were not recorded due to a lack of evidence. However the gap between BCS and police figures is reducing due to a new police recoding criteria. Disadvantages of victim surveys are that it’s not reliable even though it is the largest victim survey it only interviews a small population. Also it doesn’t include crimes against business and it also excludes a wide population, under 16’s, who are most likely to be victims of crime. The youth are most statistically more involved in crime as well which allows sociologist to assume rationalisation is a bulwark against crime because as you get older and how more at risk your criminality reduces. Young also criticised victim surveys as he argues there is a lack of validity as individuals definitions of what crime is differ, so the same incident is mentioned by one person but not another. Young also argues that some are more willing to reveal their experiences than others; although he does acknowledge the fact they have a place in research. With regards to validity victim surveys can’t be very valid as the statistics are based on victim memories of recollection which is often faulty and bias. Victim surveys also omit crimes that are ‘high-brow’, white-collar crimes such as fraud and crimes which victims don’t know their being in that situation. Therefore this allows Box to suggest that white-collar crimes allow us to see the relations of power and how vital they are in shaping the perception of crime and how the elite have the ability to avoid criminalisation through having high levels of social capital and being able to negotiate justice. Also BCS is a typical cross-sectional survey therefore it contains some errors e.g. doesn’t provide detailed information about particular places i.e. some areas of crime are over focused. Also methodologies behind official statistics are influenced greatly by the media and its sensitisation as they are dependent upon the populations’ awareness of their victimisation. This is because in a media saturated society people are dependent upon tings such as the media to tell them all about aspects of contemporary life, and the media through its ability to amplify situations illustrates and heightens sensitivity towards certain forms of behaviour.
Another method of collecting data on crime is via self-report studies which shine a light on the dark figure of crime. Self-report studies ask respondents to reveal crimes they have committed and for obvious reasons this has been criticised for lacking in validity as respondents may lie or exaggerate even if they don’t mean to mislead they may simply be mistaken e.g. Bowling and Graham found the working-classes were more likely to admit to their crimes, and supporting this is Miller as he suggests it’s because it’s part of their culture and a ‘vocal concern’ with regards to building their ‘macho’ identities. Self-report studies have been important in researching who commits the crimes as Box suggested in his study of 40 juveniles, crime is not just committed by the working-class youngsters but also the middle-classes however the middle-classes got caught less. This is supported by Streeter who suggested that selective law enforcement is adapted by the police who systematically create criminals by stigmatising the working-class youth which may lead to a negative concept and therefore a negative self-fulfilling prophecy (Jacobson and Rosenthal). This is also supported by Chambliss who did a study on working-class rough necks and middle-class saints and found although the saints committed more crimes the rough necks were caught more which suggests the police criminalised the working-classes. Maguire adds to theses point says he suggested most respondents in his study admitted to committing crime, and he found there was particularly high levels of property crime which suggests an increase in consumerism has made people seeking innovated means as to achieving their goals of materialistic wealth. Self-report studies have been criticised for issues of representativeness as the surveys consist of mostly young people because it’s easier to gain access into this group therefore self-report studies neglect organised crimes such as the mafia. However a positive evaluation is that it avoids the systematic bias created by the government organisations e.g. police. It allows those who are scared of being penalised to report the crime; however it’s mostly useful for delinquent crimes and that is why a disadvantage is that it’s not suitable for indictable crimes e.g. murder.
Another form of collecting data on a wider scale is official statistics conducted by the home office as means for getting information about crime and getting the exact numbers of offences, victims, sentences ect. Over the years statistics have found that the public fear of being a victim has increased, as public assessments consistently overestimate the actual amount of crime in Britain. This stark difference between the levels of crime and fear of crime has been attributed to the way crime is portrayed and reported in the media and how the tabloid papers place an extra emphasis on particular headlines to grab readers’ attention. Fletcher and Allen identify some factors which affect the fear of crime: locality, age, gender, perception disorder and wealth. Ironically Pantaza and Gordan found that the poor, who are criminalised and seen as the typical criminal, are most likely to fear crime as the consequences of crime is more severe for people in materially deprived areas. Official statistics have been criticised for introducing a systematic bias into the study of crime e.g. Streeter and the selective law enforcement, stigmatising the lower-class ethnic males in the inner-city and ignoring the huge amounts of white-collar crimes which cost 5 times more than blue-collar crime (Karestdet and Farrell). However on the other hand official statistics provide a readymade resource for sociologists interested in crime, although a negative feature would be that social construction of such data means that they don’t describe the real rate of crime and can lead to a fear of crime that is undetected to an individual. Although a positive evaluation would be that official statistics show sufficient regulations and patterns across time to demonstrate something about the extent of reported crime; not just a snap-shot. They are also used as a guide for the formation of social policies in relation to crime by governments and social control agencies.
