Deadly Demographics: Population Characteristics and Forecasting Homicide Trends

Violence research has identified demographic subgroups—distinguished by age, race and gender—having widely varying rates of offending. According to the demographic hypothesis used in criminology, as these segments grow or contract in proportionate size, the aggregate offending rate tends to rise or...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Crime and delinquency 2003-07, Vol.49 (3), p.339-359
Main Authors: Fox, James Alan, Piquero, Alex R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Crime
Crime and criminals
Crime rate
Criminology
Demographic change
Demographics
Demography
Forecasting
Forecasts
Homicide
Murder
Murders & murder attempts
Population
Social change
Social conditions
Statistics
Trends
U.S.A
United States
USA
Violent deaths
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Violence research has identified demographic subgroups—distinguished by age, race and gender—having widely varying rates of offending. According to the demographic hypothesis used in criminology, as these segments grow or contract in proportionate size, the aggregate offending rate tends to rise or fall as a result. In this article, we use data from the Supplementary Homicide Reports from 1976 through 1999 to assess the extent to which demographic change can account for the massive drop in homicide rates that occurred during the 1990s, and then attempt to develop a demographically based forecast of future trends in murder.
ISSN:0011-1287
1552-387X
DOI:10.1177/0011128703049003001