Deck 2: The Nature of Crime and Victimization

Question 1

While there are differences between crime data sources, the crime patterns and trends that are recorded are often very similar.​

Answer 1

True

Question 2

About two-thirds of Americans believe crime is increasing, despite the fact that crime has been decreasing for 20 years.

Answer 2

True

Question 3

Crime rates are highest in the fall months.

Answer 3

False

Question 4

Self-report studies indicate a significant rise in the number of teens using drugs.​

Question 5

Research suggests that gang members are responsible for a large proportion of all violent offenses committed during the adolescent years.​

Question 6

The availability of legalized abortion is one factor that has recently been theorized to explain the drop in crime rates.

Question 7

Arrest and punishment is highly effective at deterring chronic offenders.​

Question 8

The National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) requires local police agencies to provide a brief account of each incident and arrest within 22 crime patterns, including incident, victim, and offender information.

Question 9

Marital status has no influence on one's likelihood of victimization.​

Question 10

Chronic offenders are serious and persistent offenders who are responsible for a small portion of a serious criminal behavior.

Question 11

Over the past 20 years, the crime rate in the United States has been steadily increasing.

Question 12

Research shows that immigrants are much more crime prone than the general population, so that as the number of immigrants increases, per capita crime rates increase dramatically.​

Question 13

The elderly crime rate has remained stable for the past 20 years.

Question 14

Approximately 75 percent of Americans self-report having a gun at home or elsewhere on their property.

Question 15

Trajectory theory suggests that human development is controlled by a "master" latent trait.

Question 16

Most offenders possess a gun, which explains why many anticrime advocates are against gun ownership.​

Question 17

The Uniform Crime Report (UCR) provides information on the personal characteristics of offenders that is not available from any other sources, such as attitudes, values, and beliefs.

Question 18

Young people face a much higher rate of victimization than older individuals.​

Question 19

Deteriorating neighborhoods attract law violators; this is known as the relative deprivation hypothesis.

Question 20

Subcultural values are handed down from one generation to the next through the culture of poverty.

Question 21

According to this view, criminal law is a set of rules, codified by state authorities, which express norms, goals, and values of the vast majority of society.

A)Conflict
B)Consensus
C)Interactionist
D)Moral entrepreneur

Question 22

Which of the following is not a problem associated with the NCVS

A)Individuals may misrepresent the time line of events.
B)Overreporting because of victim's misrepresentations of events.
C)Incomplete acts are lumped together with completed ones.
D)Underreporting stemming from the embarrassment of reporting crime.

Question 23

Consideration of bipolar disorder and its role in criminal behavior would fall under biosocial theory.​

Question 24

What is considered to be the most widely cited source of criminal statistics

A)UCRs
B)NCVS
C)National Indicators of Drug Abuse
D)Bureau of Justice Statistics

Question 25

Which of the following is a problem associated with the validity of the UCR

A)No federal crimes are reported.
B)If an offender commits multiple crimes, only the most serious is recorded.
C)Reports are voluntary and vary in accuracy.
D)Crime rates per 50,000 people are computed.

Question 26

Which type of data prefers the use of interviews and questionnaires for high-school students

A)Observational
B)Victimization
C)Self-report
D)Official

Question 27

Which view of crime suggests that criminal law is structured to reflect the preferences and opinions of people who hold social power in a particular legal jurisdiction

A)Moral entrepreneur
B)Conflict
C)Consensus
D)Interactionist

Question 28

Which of the following is not one of the three methods used to express crime data in the UCR

A)Number of crimes reported to the police and arrests.
B)Data from Monitoring the Future collected every two years.
C)Year over year percentage changes in the number of crimes.
D)Crime rate per 100,000 people.

Question 29

According to biosocial theory, elements of the environment interact with biological factors to influence behavior.​

Question 30

It is possible that the link between crime and mental illness is spurious: that is, both mental illness and criminal behavior may be the result of some other, independent variable.

Question 31

A Crime Index is:

A)a measure of all crime, including crimes reported and crimes not reported to the police.
B)an accurate picture of the number of crimes committed.
C)an estimate of crime that is not reported to the police.
D)an estimate of crimes committed.

Question 32

Which of the following is an index crime

A)Kidnapping
B)Forgery
C)Simple assault
D)Motor vehicle theft

Question 33

Moral entrepreneurs, people who wage moral crusades to control criminal law, are a part of which view of crime

A)Interactionist
B)Conflict
C)Consensus
D)All of the above

Question 34

The NCVS is prepared by what agency

A)Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
B)Central Intelligence Agency
C)National Institute of Health
D)Bureau of Justice Statistics

Question 35

Which of the following crimes is not included on the list of Part I index crimes documented in the UCRs

A)Simple assault
B)Arson
C)Motor vehicle theft
D)Criminal homicide

Question 36

Research shows a link between mental illness and crime.

Question 37

What data source relies on a multistage sample of housing units to collect information about citizen's encounters with criminals

A)Monitoring the Future Survey
B)NCVS
C)National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS)
D)UCRs

Question 38

The NCVS asks participants to report on the frequency and characteristics of all but which one of the following crimes

A)Assault
B)Murder
C)Rape
D)Robbery

Question 39

The law is the instrument that enables the wealthy to maintain the position of power and to control the behavior of those who oppose their ideas according to which view of crime

A)Conflict
B)Interactionist
C)Moral entrepreneur
D)Consensus

Question 40

According to social structure theory, an offender weighs the consequences and benefits of their actions before engaging in criminal behavior.

Question 41

Which of the following characteristics does not increase one's likelihood of victimization

A)Being male
B)Being young
C)Being married
D)Living in a large urban area

Question 42

For serious violent crimes, the males account for ___ percent of all arrests.

A)20
B)40
C)60
D)80

Question 43

According to the Monitoring the Future study, approximately ____ percent of teenagers report hurting someone badly enough that the victim needed medical care

A)1
B)5
C)15
D)25

Question 44

When a man is the victim of a violent crime, the perpetrator is usually described as a(n):​

A)Stranger
B)Acquaintance
C)Relative
D)Wife/girlfriend

Question 45

Which of the following groups experience violent crimes at a higher rate than other groups

A)Whites
B)African-Americans
C)Asians
D)Latinos

Question 46

Which of the following is false regarding the age-crime relationship

A)Young people are part of a youth culture that favors risk taking and behaviors that may involve law violation.
B)Youths have unlimited access to their parent's money.
C)Youths are psychological immature.
D)Youths are aware of the lack of punitiveness of the juvenile justice system.

Question 47

____ theory maintains that everyone has the potential to become criminal.

A)Social structure
B)Social learning
C)Social control
D)Social reaction

Question 48

Which regions of the country usually have significantly higher rates of crime

A)The Midwest and New England
B)The West and the South
C)The Midwest and the South
D)New England and the West

Question 49

____ theory focuses on the economic and political forces operating in a society and views these forces as the fundamental causes of criminality.

A)Conflict
B)Social control
C)Developmental
D)Social structure

Question 50

Most reported crimes occur during which season

A)Winter
B)Summer
C)Spring
D)Fall

Question 51

The Monitoring the Future study found teen alcohol use and cigarette use at their lowest points since ____.

A)1975
B)1990
C)2000
D)2010

Question 52

Weighing consequences and benefits is the foundation of ___________ theory.​

A)social process
B)routine activities
C)social structure
D)rational choice

Question 53

Which of the following statements about the validity of self-report data is false

A)Serious chronic offenders usually cooperate.
B)Some surveys contain an overabundance of trivial offenses.
C)Institutionalized youth are not generally represented.
D)The "known group" can be used to assess validity.

Question 54

The culture of poverty is part of which theoretical perspective

A)Social structure theory
B)Psychological theory
C)Social process theory
D)Rational choice theory

Question 55

What type of study is the best measure of unreported crimes

A)Victimization surveys
B)Prison data
C)Self-report studies
D)Official records

Question 56

Which view of crime suggests that individuals are born "good" and become "bad" as they mature

A)Social reaction theory
B)Social control theory
C)Social structure theory
D)Social learning theory

Question 57

Since 1993, the rate of violent victimization has declined by about _____ percent.

A)20
B)40
C)60
D)80

Question 58

According to ____ theory, indicators of neighborhood disorder are highly predictive of crime rates.

A)social structure
B)developmental
C)social process
D)conflict

Question 59

The greater the proportion of ____ in the population, the higher the crime rate and the greater the number of persistent offenders.

A)middle-aged women
B)young women
C)middle-aged men
D)young men

Question 60

Which of the following is false regarding the victim-offender relationship

A)There is no racial pattern in single-offender robberies.
B)Women are more likely than men to be victimized by an acquaintance.
C)Most crimes are committed by a single offender.
D)Minorities are the offenders in a majority of single-offender rapes and assaults.

Question 61

Andrew has decided that he is going to rob a bank to pay off his debts after losing his job. He buys a gun from a kid who lives in an economically depressed section of town but he doesn't ask where the gun came from. On the day of the robbery, Andrew decides that he will shoot at the ceiling inside the bank to get everyone's attention. But as he shoots, the bullet ricochets and strikes a bank teller. The teller dies instantly and in the process of Andrew's getaway, he drops his gun.
How will the majority of Andrew's crimes be categorized

A)Part I
B)Part II
C)Part III
D)Part IV

Question 62

​____ theory would advocate against the use of the sex offender registry for low-level offenders due to its stigma.

A)Social structure
B)Social learning
C)Social control
D)Social reaction

Question 63

Criticisms of UCR data include ______________ of the victims and law enforcement.

Question 64

The ____________________ is one who has serious and persistent brushes with the law and whose behavior may be excessively violent and destructive.

Question 65

____ theory recognizes that as people mature, the factors that influence their behavior change.

A)Social structure
B)Developmental
C)Psychological
D)Social process

Question 66

________ are people who wage crusades to control criminal law so that it reflects their own personal values.

Question 67

The ____________________ view of crime suggests that moral entrepreneurs define crime.​

Question 68

Andrew has decided that he is going to rob a bank to pay off his debts after losing his job. He buys a gun from a kid who lives in an economically depressed section of town but he doesn't ask where the gun came from. On the day of the robbery, Andrew decides that he will shoot at the ceiling inside the bank to get everyone's attention. But as he shoots, the bullet ricochets and strikes a bank teller. The teller dies instantly and in the process of Andrew's getaway, he drops his gun.
Which theoretical explanation most closely fits with Andrew's actions

A)Personality theory
B)Social learning theory
C)Cognitive theory
D)Rational choice theory

Question 69

The _____________________ states that as the poverty of minorities in the population increases, so too does the amount of social control that the public directs at those minority group members.

Question 70

Murder, forcible rape, robbery, burglary, larceny, motor vehicle theft, arson, and ____________________ make up the FBI's Part I crimes.

Question 71

The judge believes selling drugs is inherently destructive and dangerous and that by punishing John, he will learn to control his actions in the future. The judge's view of the criminal justice system is likely the _____ view.

A)crime control
B)due process
C)interactionist
D)consensus

Question 72

Andrew has decided that he is going to rob a bank to pay off his debts after losing his job. He buys a gun from a kid who lives in an economically depressed section of town but he doesn't ask where the gun came from. On the day of the robbery, Andrew decides that he will shoot at the ceiling inside the bank to get everyone's attention. But as he shoots, the bullet ricochets and strikes a bank teller. The teller dies instantly and in the process of Andrew's getaway, he drops his gun.
Only the most serious of Andrew's crimes has been reported to the public using this reporting mechanism.

A)NIBRS
B)Self-report survey​
C)UCR
D)NCVS

Question 73

In a study entitled Delinquency in a Birth Cohort, researchers found that chronic offenders:

A)are more likely to continue criminality if they are female.
B) become adult repeat offenders
C)are deterred from further criminality if arrested during youth chronic offending.
D)commit the most violent acts of all criminals.

Question 74

June is 80 years old and is terrified of having her home burglarized or becoming a victim in another way, so she tries not to leave the house. She has never been a victim of crime but is aware that her neighborhood may not be as safe as it used to be. One afternoon when she does decide to leave the house, her home is burglarized and her television is stolen.
June decides not to report the burglary to the police because she feels that the break-in was her fault. Which crime measurement tool is most likely to record June's case

A)NIBRS
B)Self-report study
C)UCR
D)NCVS ​

Question 75

June is 80 years old and is terrified of having her home burglarized or becoming a victim in another way, so she tries not to leave the house. She has never been a victim of crime but is aware that her neighborhood may not be as safe as it used to be. One afternoon when she does decide to leave the house, her home is burglarized and her television is stolen.
After the burglary, June is ever more fearful of her neighbors and the crime that goes on in her community. June is not justified in her thoughts because:

A)violent victimizations are decreasing.
B)youth crime is on the rise.
C)crime against the elderly is increasing dramatically.
D)home invasions are on the rise.

Question 76

John was born into a family that didn't have very much money, and it seemed that his parents struggled to put and keep food on the table. As he grew up, he found school boring despite being smart, so he dropped out. He was always impulsive and finding a job took too long. John recently found out that he is going to be a father and wants to provide the best opportunity for his child that he can. To support himself and his unborn child, he gets involved in selling pain pills and he is arrested in a sting operation.
John's view of the criminal justice system is likely the ___________ view.

A)conflict
B)consensus
C)crime control
D)interactionist

Question 77

____________________ is another name associated with the eight index crimes from the UCRs.

Question 78

____________________ question large groups of high school students about their participation in criminal or delinquent acts.

Question 79

Most researchers would consider this explanation of John's behavior part of the _____ theory.

A)trajectory
B)developmental
C)propensity
D)life course

Question 80

​________, most simply, is a violation of criminal law.