NCJ Number
140976
Journal
Deviance et societe Volume: 16 Issue: 1 Dated: (March 1992) Pages: 49-68
Date Published
1992
Length
20 pages
Annotation
The article criticizes a victimization study conducted in 14 countries in early 1989.
Abstract
In each country a random sample population were asked through Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing whether they had become crime victims in 1988. The results showed the United States to have the highest percentage of victims followed by Canada, Australia, and the Netherlands. In their publication "Experiences of Crime Across the World: Key Findings of the 1989 International Crime Survey," Dijk, Mayhew, and Killias draw sweeping conclusions concerning the criminality of each of the countries studied. However, this article argues that the study does not warrant the conclusion that criminality in the Netherlands is the highest in Europe. The authors present the following methodological criticism: the limited types of offenses studied, the exclusion of corporations and public institutions as potential victims, the unreliability of telephone interviewing, the small sample sizes in some countries, the significant number of non-responses, and problems in the statistical analysis of the results. The article concludes that presently direct comparisons between the criminality of different countries are not possible. 19 references