While previous studies have assessed public opinions for arming teachers in K-12 schools in the United States, comparatively less research has focused on understanding teachers' opinions for such policies and assessed whether and to what extent school- and individual-level factors are associated with differences in support. The current study aims to address these voids in the current body of literature by analyzing self-report data from a large sample of Texas K-12 educators (N = 9,196) to assess relations between theoretical correlates of teacher and staff gun carrying, demographic as well as school characteristics, and support for carrying. A series of logistic regression models reveal that favorable views of an emergency operation plan in a school setting and general negative view of guns in school are associated with lower odds of support. The strength of these associations varies across teacher and school characteristics. The implications of the reported results for K-12 school policy is discussed.

The current review explores multiple definitions of school shootings used by myriad data collection platforms and by various scholars. Importantly, the impacts of definitional discrepancies on inclusion criteria, data divergence, research, policy, and public perception are discussed at length. The review concludes with a call to Criminologists and school gun violence scholars to better collaborate on what should be considered a “school shooting” and lists five benefits that may result from modifying school gun violence definitions and data collection methodologies.

Prior research focusing on mass shootings in the US has established the significant role of weapons in these events. Despite the extensive literature on the topic, minimal consideration has been given to the specific muzzle energy and caliber of ammunition used in these events and whether these factors influence the outcome of these shooting incidents. The current study examined the effect of muzzle energy and caliber of ammunition on the number of victims killed and injured in mass shootings. Analysis of The Violence Project (Version 6) mass shooting dataset indicated that the muzzle energy of the ammunition used in a mass shooting was positively associated with the number of people killed and total victims while the caliber of the ammunition was negatively associated with those outcomes. However, these findings were largely accounted for by the use of an assault weapon with high-capacity magazines.

Prior research on crime hot spots has been mostly concerned with the analyses of cross-sectional data or short-term aggregations. Less research, however, has conducted longitudinal analyses on homicide hot spots and their dynamic behavior over time. The current study assessed 5 years of Chicago homicides (2016–2020) by police beats to explore how hot spots of homicides behave, with specific attention to durability. We find that Chicago homicides spatially and temporally cluster, with analysis suggesting the emergence of seasonal, short term, and long term “durable” hotspots in Chicago. Policy implications such as police interventions and community policing and problem-solving opportunities are discussed.

RATIONALE:While empirical interest in understanding the mental health consequences surrounding gun violence has increased, currently there is much unknown about the long reach of childhood exposure to gun violence on handgun carrying across the life course.OBJECTIVE:The current study aims to evaluate the relations between witnessing gun violence before age 12 and subsequent handgun-carrying behavior from adolescence to adulthood in a nationally representative sample of U.S. youth.METHODS:Data from 15 waves from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997) are analyzed (Ns range from 5695 to 5875 participants). Categorical latent growth curve models are estimated to assess individual differences in handgun-carrying behavior over time and the relationships between childhood exposure to gun violence, initial levels during adolescence, and rates of change from adolescence to adulthood.RESULTS:Participants who reported witnessing seeing someone shot or shot at in childhood demonstrated higher odds of carrying a handgun in adolescence. Exposure to gun violence was not associated with changes in the odds of handgun carrying from adolescence to adulthood after controlling for theoretically relevant covariates.CONCLUSIONS:Childhood exposure to gun violence appears to be a risk factor for handgun carrying in adolescence. Nonetheless, other behaviors and demographic characteristics account for inter-individual differences in changes in handgun carrying across the life course.

This research note empirically assessed similarities and differences among three open-source data sets from 2015-2019. Fatal police shooting incidents were compared across Washington Post, Mapping Police Violence, and Fatal Encounters data over a five-year period. One-way ANOVAs, bivariate correlations, and proportional percentage differences were used to examine mean differences, correlational strength, and yearly percentage difference trends. No significant mean differences were observed between Fatal Encounters, Mapping Police Violence, and Washington Post. With one exception, bivariate correlations between all three data source dyads were consistently strong. Percentage difference comparisons among data source dyads, however, revealed that the sources are becoming more dissimilar in their reporting of fatal shootings over time. Our results complement existing literature that has compared open-source police shooting data to government sources and suggest that the three data sources were strongly associated with one another from 2015-2019. Increasing differences between sources, however, necessitate continued inspection of the data across the various open-source platforms over time.

Prior research has suggested factors such as university and program ranking may impact master's students' decisions to attend particular doctoral programs. One source of this information is likely their graduate director. However, sparse research exists on graduate directors' referrals to doctoral education and specific programs. To address this gap in the literature, we surveyed 143 criminal justice graduate directors at masters-granting institutions across the U.S. Respondents were asked about the factors that influence their decisions to (1) recommend students to doctoral education, (2) recommend specific Ph.D. programs, (3) their perceptions of the quality of education at specific programs and (4) their likelihood of referring students to those doctoral programs. Results suggest that the referral decision is a multi-faceted concept. Findings also indicate that master's program graduate directors' ranking of criminal justice Ph.D. programs diverge from popular rankings of similar Ph.D. programs. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.

Prior research suggests there are inconsistencies between the UCR and other National-level crime data sources. Less research has tested whether similar inconsistencies exist between UCR and State annual crime reports. The current study compared 48 U.S. State’s Part I offense counts to the FBI’s UCR’s Part I offense counts for the years 2000–2018. Paired samples t-tests revealed significant differences for specific Part I offense counts as reported by individual States and the UCR. Percentage differences further indicated that the magnitudes of differences were substantively meaningful. Pairwise correlations indicated strong linear associations and convergence between State and UCR Part I offenses Nationally, but convergence diminished when assessing individual States. Frequency and percentage differences were treated as dependent variables in multivariate models. Results from OLS regressions suggest certain State-level factors significantly predict the observed differences between State and UCR reported Part I offenses. These results reveal that inconsistencies exist between two official data sources which have the same origin.

Previous studies have found that individual, environmental, geographic, and demographic factors correlate with adolescent gun carrying. Comparatively less research has focused on identifying correlates of adolescent gun carrying to schools. The current study examined whether previously identified factors associated with adolescent gun carrying similarly predict adolescent school gun carrying. Logistic regression models were used to predict risk of school gun carrying among a nationally representative sample of adolescent males (n = 4559). Results revealed that a range of individualand environmental-level factors increased the odds of school gun carrying, including a 13% increased likelihood of carrying a gun to school among individuals with more symptoms of anxiety and depression. Additionally, analyses indicated that several in dividualand environmental-level factors differentially increase the likelihood of school gun carrying across race and ethnicity. Policies aimed at reducing gun carrying in schools should address both the known correlates of adolescent school gun carrying broadly and the specific correlates of gun carrying as they vary across particular groups of youth. Future research should attempt to replicate these and other studies findings across diverse samples of adolescents and identify other potential correlates of adolescent school gun carrying not previously addressed. Public significance statement: Mental health, school-level, and geographic factors are associated with school gun carrying differentially across race and ethnicity. Programming efforts may benefit from considering the influence of race/ethnicity on dynamic risk factors for school gun carrying when designing and implementing school safety measures.