Whether Local Social Media Reflect the True Violent and Non-violent Crime Rates?

Whether Local Social Media Reflect the True Violent and Non-violent Crime Rates?

Throughout the case study of Jill Meagher, Sanja Milivojevic and Alyce McGovern reveal the importance of social media and suggest that criminologists should take full advantage of this kind new information technologies (cite). The growing importance of social media on criminology aspect is recognized by more and more people, like Jeremy Prichard introduces the social media sentiment analysis (SMSA) might be used as a future empirical tool to measure the public opinions and attitudes to crimes (cite), and Perin Michelle points out that social media is beneficial in reducing crime rates (cite). The association between social media and crime becomes stronger with the development of social media. From the traditional social media (radio and newspaper) to the new social media (telephone and computer), the role of an audience’s engagement with crimes changes from a “passive audience” to a “proactive participant” (cite). Although the social media is important in the contribution toward criminology studies, whether the social media real reflect the proportion of crimes rates have to be considered. If the local social media report the crime news based on the severity of crime news, then local social media will tend to report more violent crimes rather than non-violent crimes. The second hypothesis is that the local social media exactly reflect each crime events. The third hypothesis is that the local social media report crime news by its free will.

Method

Design

Two local social media, CBC news and Globe and Mail, will be used to select research samples based on its convenience. CBC news and Globe and Mail could easily be googled on any web browsers. In each media’s official website search crimes. The top 20 recent crime news (N=20) would be selected as our sample. Then, we will distinguish those crime news are violent crimes or non-violent crimes by applying Bussa Law definition.

Material

The article of “the difference between violent and non-violent crimes” that posted on Bussa Law will be used as our guidelines (cite).

“The difference between the two is evident in definition, severity and sentences. Non-violent crimes are defined as a crime where no injury or force is used on another person. Non-violent crimes are often measured in terms of loss to the victim or economic damage. Non-violent crimes are most often some type of theft or larceny” (cite).

Calculation

After knowing the number of violent crimes and non-violent crimes, we are able to calculate the violent and non-violent crime rates on each local social media. Let X = the number of Violent Crimes, Y = the number of Non-violent Crimes. The violent crime rates will be X divided by (X + Y), the non-violent crime rate will be (1 – Violent Crime rates). Both social medias violent and non-violent crimes rates would be calculated by applying the above formulas.

Result

The results of calculation will fall into three categories. The first category is that both local social medias show higher violent crime rates and lower non-violent crime rates. For example, both social medias show about 40 percent violent crime rather than 10 percent. The second category is that the result of each type crime rates on the local social medias are similar to crime statistic reports. The third category includes all the results that not fall into the first and the second categories. For instance, CBC news might have the higher violent crime rate, but Globe and Mail might have the lower violent crime rate; Or in another situation that both social medias have a lower violent crime rate; Or CBC news that get the violent crime rates close to 10% but Globe and Mail might get a larger or smaller violent crime rates

Discussion

If the result is showed in the first category, then the first hypothesis would be proved; if the result falls into the second category, apparently, the social media exactly reflect the crime statistics; if the results fall into the third category, more attentions would be demanded to explain what data reflects. Because the sample size is small and only two social medias are used in the study based on the convenience. The limitation of this study could be reduced by include more social medias and a larger sample size.

After summarizing the results, the implication of the result would be discussed. At the end, discussing what kind of further studies should be conducted in the future.

Reference

Milivojevic, S., & McGovern, A. (2014). The Death of Jill Meagher: Crime and Punishment on Social Media. International Journal For Crime, Justice & Social Democracy, 3(3), 22-39. doi:10.5204/ijcjsd.v3i2.144

Prichard, J., Watters, P., Krone, T., Spiranovic, C., & Cockburn, H. (2015). Social Media Sentiment Analysis: A New Empirical Tool for Assessing Public Opinion on Crime?. Current Issues In Criminal Justice, 27(2), 217-236.

Surette, R. (2015). Performance Crime and Justice. Current Issues In Criminal Justice, 27(2), 195-216.

Perin, M. (2017). Engage in Social Media for Overall Crime Prevention: Social media helps agencies connect with their communities and in some cases has aided in reducing crime. Law Enforcement Technology, 44(11), 14-18.