The Social Construction of Victim Survey Data

The National Crime Victims Survey was con- ducted by experienced census interviewers who received special training for the task. Data on crime victimisations were collected as an adjunct to a larger social survey. The section on crime research was introduced: As you know. crime is a problem. While we know something about the peoplc who commit crimes, we know very little about the victims. So reports I am going to ask whether you have been a victim of any of the following crimes within thc last 12 months.

This introduction directs our attention to the sociological concern that ’crime’ is treated in victim survey data as a ’problem’ which is taken Crime Victimisation Rates in for granted, not as problematic. The interviewer Australian Cities* then goes on to ask questions about tcn types of crime: John Braithwaite and Break and enter: Within the last 12 months did David Biles anyone break into your home or attempt to Australian Institute of Criminology break in? Motor nehicle theft: During the last 12 months did anyone take your motor vehicle without The National Crime Victims Survey conducted permission even if it was recovered? by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 1975 in- with violence: Within the last 12 cludes data on the criminal victimisation of months have you been robbed? That is, did any- ten different of 18,694 by types one use violence or threaten violence to take crime. Unlike earlier Australian victimisation anything from you? surveys by Wilson and Brown (1973) and Tliejt: In the last 12 months have had Congalton and Najman (1974), which were you any- else stolen such as restricted to specific regions and relatively small thing something from your car, house or samples, the Bureau of Statistics survey provides backyard? data on a large, representative, and national Fraud, forgery, false pretences: In the last 12 sample of Australians. months have you been the victim of fraud, or false For have Until now inter-city comparisons of Australian forgery pretences? example, crime rates have not been possible since: you been given a bad cheque, cheated out of or or has been crime between money property your signaturc (a) Definitions of categories forged? States have not always been comparable. Sex offences: In the last 12 months have (b) Rates for reporting crime to the police you been the victim of any of the sex from State to State, and there are following vary offences: variations both within and between police forces in the diligence with which -Peeping? victims are sought out and their victimi- -Indecent exposure? sation officially recorded. -Rape or attempted rape? States have not recorded crime (c) generally Nui,mfice call.s: Within the last 12 months have rates by city. you received any threats, abuses, or indecent All of these problems of police statistics are suggestions on the telephone? avoided in the present analysis. However, we Assault: In the last 12 months have you been shall now see that there are of other problems attacked in either with or without a kinds which victimisation any way plague surveys. weapon? After each of these, if the answer were * This paper was made possible by the generous the was asked ’How assistance and co-operation given to the Australian affirmative, respondent Institute of Criminology by the staff of the Aus- often has this happened?’. Questions on break tralian Bureau of Statistics. and enter and vehicle theft were asked only of

Downloaded from jos.sagepub.com at Australian National University on January 13, 2015 79 the person who was nominated by the household surveys have been criticised both for under- as the owner of the house or motor vehicle. The counting (Maltz, 1975) and for overcounting questions on sex offences were asked only of (Levine, 1976). In addition to the problems of female respondents. For all other offences every the theoretical inadequacy of legal definitions, person over 15 years of age in the samplcd lack of understanding of these definitions by household was questioned. The interviews either subjects or interviewers, wilful exaggera- generally took place in a group family situation. tion or concealment, and forgetting or forward If after call-backs certain household members telescoping of events, there is the possibility of could not be found at home, interviewers were the respondent being in error about what actually permitted to obtain information about the miss- happened (for example the person who mis- ing members from others in the household. It places a wallet and then reports it as stolen). was left to the discretion of the interviewer to Victimisation surveys therefore do not give us determine whether or one-to-one inter- group anything like ’true’ crime rates. While their views were more appropriate. estimates of the numbers of incidents of various Interviewers were supplied with a manual in- types which are taking place in the community corporating instructions dcfining the meaning of are undoubtedly closer to the reality than police the terms used in individual questions. The statistics, we should be wary of replacing definitions were designed to maximise corres- cynicism about police statistics with undue faith pondence with legal definitions. Most inter- in victimisation statistics. A number of call-back viewers and respondents, however, were not studies (Biderman et nl., 1967; Ennis, 1967; lawyers. If, for example, a female respondent U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1970a, 1970b; were to report that her husband had raped her, L.E.A.A., 1972) have shown that faulty memory the interviewer might not be aware that this does is a problem with crime victim surveys, though not. in the law of most Australian jurisdictions, Gottfredson and Hindelang (1977) found that constitutc rape. This example also illustrates how memory error tended to be random rather than even if resnondents and intervicwers were to be systematically related to characteristics of the expert lawyers, what might be obtained is a re- victim (such as age, race, education). liable measure which is not valid from certain The most thorough check on victim survey theoretical standpoints (in this case, feminist data was the San Jose reverse record check theory) . (L.E.A.A., 1972). Persons known to have been The with the victim greatest single problem victims of crime on the basis of police records is therefore that it takes the survey methodology were interviewed to ascertain whether they would law for as the most obvious foundation granted report the victimisation to an interviewer. for when most would analysis, sociologists Twenty-six per cent of known victims of assault, of which have either prefer categories analysis robbery, rape, burglary and larceny failed to re- theoretical relevance of phenomenological port this in the interview. Important as reverse coherence, or both. The reliability problem record checks are in furthering our limited should not be underestimated. The discrepancy of the of victimisation between, for example, lay typifications of what knowledge adequacy data, they miss what is likely to be the most im- it means to be robbed and the legal definition of source of error-victimisations which robbery (as distinct from theft) might be wide. portant are reported to neither police nor interviewers. Quite apart from the innocent discrepancies between legal and lay conceptions of crime, it is likely that many respondents will have good Sample reasons for wilfully concealing or exaggerating Dwellings for inclusion in the stratified multi- the extent of their victimisation. While there may stage area sample were selected from all parts of be many victimisations for which respondents excluding the , rural were not to call in the but which prepared police regions, and locations with a population of less they are prepared to report in an anonymous than 500 people. Of 10,500 dwelling sites census interview, there will be others which they originally selected, 9,200 contained effective are not prepared to report to either. households, of which 8,414 provided data for the A further problem is the more straightforward survey. These households contained 18,694 per- one of poor recall. Events which took place more sons aged 15 years and over, each of whom than a year prior to the interview may be re- supplied some data. The remarkable household called as having taken place ’within the last 12 response rate of 91.5 % is only possible, of months’. Other events which did take place course, in a survey conducted by a body which within the previous twelve months may be has the experience and authority of the Bureau simply forgotten. Not surprisingly then, victim of Statistics.2

80 Downloaded from jos.sagepub.com at Australian National University on January 13, 2015 Comparing State Capitals with Small Which Australian City Has the Highest Cities and Towns Victim-Reported Crime Rate? Table 1 compares crime victimisation rates for Comparisons between capital cities in crime respondents who lived in State capital cities ratcs revealed by the victimisation survey are versus respondents from outside the metropolitan generally meaningful since over 70% of the areas. Canberra is included in the latter category 18,694 respondents resided in a State capital. as are the large cities of Newcastle and Wol- Standard errors with respect to are longong. Since locations with fewer than 500 in- high even though the sampling was such as to habitants were excluded from the survey the obtain an abnormally large number of interviews comparison is not an urban-rural one, but a from Tasmania expressly so that it would be comparison between State capital cities and other statistically valid to make interstate comparisons. cities and towns most of which are smaller in It might have been expected that Sydney and size. Melbourne would be the citics with the highest It can be seen from Table 1 that for all crime victimisation rates. From Table ? it is clear that categories except fraud, forgery and false pre- for all but the three sexual offences-peeping, tences the State capitals have higher reported indecent exposure, and rape-Sydney has a victimisation rates. This is consistent with find- higher victim-reported crime rate than Mel- ings from victim surveys in Finland, Denmark, bourne. The difference with respect to rape is not Sweden, Norway, and England that the risk of statistically significant, so that it would be more becoming a victim of criminal violence is greater accurate to say that it is on the two sexual for people living in capital cities than for citizens offences of peeping and indecent exposure that living outside the capital in these countries Melbourne has a higher crime rate than Sydney. (Hauge and Wolf, 1974; Sparks, Genn, and Contrary to the impression one would gain Dodd, 1977: 82-83). With the exception of the from the mass media, the contest for the ’crime English data, however, the Australian differences of Australia’ is not in fact a , capital two-way do not seem as great as those from Europe. comparison between Australia’s two largest Similarly, the American National Crime Vic- cities.-&dquo; It is Perth which has the highest rate for tim Surveys have consistently shown non- break and enter, robbery with violence, fraud, metropolitan areas to have much lower victimi- forgery, false pretences, and assault. With respect sation rates than that country’s large cities to theft and peeping, even though Perth does (Gottfredson, Hindelang and Parisi, 1978: 377). not have the highest rate for all capitals, it

Table 1: Victimisation Rates per 100,000 Population 15 Years and Over by Residence in State Capital Cities versus Other Urban Centres

Table 2: Victimisation Rates per 100,000 Population 15 Years and Over in Capital Cities

Downloaded from jos.sagepub.com at Australian National University on January 13, 2015 81 been still has a higher rate than Sydney. For only which previously available data had used three of the ten types of crime-vehicle theft, as the basis for a prediction. On the rates for rape, and nuisance calls-does Sydney have a serious crimes recorded by the police, Western higher rate than Perth. Again it needs to be Australia as a whole certainly appears from pre- pointed out that the estimates with respect to vious research to be a State with a below average rape are statistically unreliable. Even though the crime rate (Biles, 1977a). national rape rate estimated from the sample is On the other hand, has sixteen times higher than the rate normally cited more people in per head of population for rapes reported to the police, the numbers of than any other State. Western Australia at pre- rapes in the survey are small in absolute terms, sent has three times the imprisonment rate of and statistical significance also becomes more and six times the imprisonment rate of improbable because the sample size is cut in the A.C.T. In 1973-74 Western Australia had half with respect to rape (only females are an imprisonment rate of 104 per 100.000 of eligible). Hence we cannot attach a great deal population compared with rates of 52 for Vic- of meaning to the fact that Table 2 shows no toria, 63 for , 67 for New South cases of female respondents from Perth reporting Wales, 77 for , and 86 for Tasmania that they had been raped during the previous (Biles, 1977b). The most recent figures available, twelve months. for April 1979 (Biles, 1979), show Western Perth is clearly the least safe Australian city Australia with a rate of 121 per 100,000, with other between 41 and 77. It in which to live from our data on these ten types States ranging a causal connection of crime. Separating the remaining cities is more would be foolish to assert Australian difficult. Overall, Sydney and Adelaide seem to between the high Western imprison- be somewhat less safe than Brisbane and Mel- ment rate and its high victimisation rate.5 what we can is that if the citi- bourne, but the differences vary with the type of Nevertheless, say offence. Motor vehicle theft is generally recog- zens of Perth think that they are protected from criminals because have locked so of nised by criminologists as a highly reliable index they many crime because of its high reportability, clarity of them away in jail, then they are mistaken. definition, perceived seriousness and conse- quently apparently good recall of the event by Standard Error victims.4 Hence, we must take special note of the fact that Sydney has a rate for this offence which With a sample of the magnitude of the is clearly higher than for any other city. Adelaide National Crime Victims Survey, problems of is distinguished by its markedly high theft rate. statistical inference loom less large than with It would seem that Hobart is the safest capital most social science data. Nevertheless, with less city in which to live, having the lowest victimi- common types of crime, marginals can become sation figure for five of the ten offences. As quite small. As a matter of policy the Bureau of pointed out earlier, however, caution is war- Statistics will not make available raw data on the ranted with the Hobart figures. number of actual victimisations of each type within the sample. Instead we are provided with estimates from the for the Conclusion weighted sample number of victimisations nationally. There can The finding that Perth is the most dangerous be no doubt that the Bureau’s weighted national Australian city in which to live with respect to estimate is a superior statistic to the raw figure. the types of crimes covered in the National The weighting procedure is such that raw figures Crime Victims Survey could be regarded as from different geographical areas will be multi- either surprising or expected depending on plied by different weights depending on the pro-

Table 3: Approximate Per Cent Standard Error for Survey Estimates of Number of Victimisations in Each Capital City

Downloaded from jos.sagepub.com at Australian National University on January 13, 2015 82 portion of the population of the nation living in 5. The reasons for and the meaning of Western Aus- tralia’s high imprisonment rate is currently the sub- that Statistical Area, and the response rate. ject of detailed research being conducted by the Western Australian Department of Corrections in While the weighting procedure provides a consultation with the Australian Institute of superior statistic it does create some complexity Criminology. for the social scientist who might be interested in calculating a conventional test of statistical REFERENCES significance. Tests of significance have not been Biderman, Albert, Johnson, Louise, McIntyre, Jennie calculated for each comparison made in this and Weir, Adrienne paper. However, Table 3 provides approximate 1967 Report on a Pilot Study in the District of Columbia on Victimization and Attitudes Toward standard errors for estimates for each survey Law Enforcement, Field Surveys I. President’s city of the number of victimisations of each Commission on Law Enforcement and Administra- tion of Justice. Washington, D.C.: Governmen’t type. Printing Office. It can be seen from Table A that the per cent Biles, David 1977a ’Serious Crime Rates’. Pp. 13-34 in D. Biles standard error on the estimated rate for break (ed.), Crime and Justice in Australia. Canberra: and enter in Sydney is approximately 17.0%. Australian Institute of Criminology and Sun The estimate of the break and enter rate Books. survey Biles, David in Sydney is 2,031.1 per 100,000 population. 1977b ’ and Prisoners’. Pp. 81-101 in D. Biles there are (cd.), Crime and Justice in Australia. Canberra: Discounting non-sampling errors, Australian Institute of Criminology and Sun Books. therefore about two chances in three that the Biles, David true break and enter rate in Sydney during 1975 1979 Australian Prison Trends No. 35. Canberra: Aus- tralian Institute of Criminology. fell between 1,685.8 and 2,376.4, and about Biles, David and Braithwaite, John nineteen chances in twenty that it fell between In press ’Crime Victims and the Police’. Australian and Psychologist 1,340.5 2,721.7. Braithwaite, John, Biles, David and Whitrod, Ray 1979 ’Who Is Afraid of Crime in Australia’. Submitted for publication. FOOTNOTES Congalton, Athol A. and Najman, Jake M. 1974 Who Are the Victims. Sydney: 1. As will be pointed out in the section on sampling, Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research. the sample is unrepresentative in the sense that it Ennis, Phillip excludes respondents from the Northern Territory 1967 Criminal Victimization in the : A (because of Cyclone Tracey) and from rural areas Report of a National Survey: Field Surveys II. with populations of fewer than 500 people. However, President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and data available on request from the authors or the Administration of Justice. Washington, D.C.: Australian Bureau of Statistics comparing sample Government Printing Office. estimates with estimates from other Census sources Gottfredson, Michael R. and Hindelang, Michael J. indicates good representativeness according to 1977 ’A Consideration of Memory Decay and Tele- number of persons and number of households by scoping Biases in Victimization Surveys’. Journal of State, persons by sex and income, persons by sex Criminal Justice, 5: 205-216. and education, persons by sex and labour force Gottfredson, Michael R., Hindelang, Michael J. and status, and persons by sex and marital status. Garofalo, James 2. For more complete details on the sampling 1978 Victims of Personal Crime: An Empirical Founda- methodology and the estimating of standard error in tion for a Theory of Personal Victimization. Cam- the Australian Crime Victims Survey see Australian bridge, Mass.: Ballinger. Bureau of Statistics, 1975 General Social Survey: Gottfredson, Michael R., Hindelang, Michael J. and Crime Victims, Ref. No. 4105.0, Australian Bureau Parisi, Nicolette (eds) of Statistics, Canberra, 1979. 1978 Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics—1977. 3. Other data from the same survey suggests that even Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, though victimisation rates might not be higher in L.E.A.A. Sydney and Melbourne than in the other capital Hauge, Ragnar and Wolf, Preben cities, fear of crime may well be. Data on how safe 1974 ’Criminal Violence in Three Scandinavian Coun- people feel walking alone at night suggest a strong tries’. Pp. 25-32 in N. Christie (ed.), Scandinavian positive correlation between fear of crime and the Studies in Criminology, Volume 5. London: size of Australian cities: Martin Robertson. In sum, these Australian results tend to mirror Law Enforcement Assistance Administration American findings that while very large cities like 1972 U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of New York are far from the objectively most Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice, Statistics dangerous in which to live, the fear of crime is Division. San Jose Methods Tests of Known Crime greatest in these very large cities. Perhaps fear of Victims. Statistical Technical Report No. 1. crime is more a function of the volume of crime Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office. taking place in the city than of the crime rate Levine, James per capita. The very largest cities, because of their 1976 ’The Potential for Crime Overreporting in Criminal sheer size, have a more constant flow of sen- Victimization Surveys’. Criminology, 14: 307-330. sational crimes to keep the media busy in the Maltz, Michael business of generating shock and fear (Braith- 1975 ’Crime Statistics: A Mathematical Perspective’. waite, Biles and Whitrod, 1979, submitted for Journal of Criminal Justice, 3: 177-194. publication). Sparks, Richard F., Genn, Hazel G. and Dodd, David J. 4. See, for example, Task Force Report, Crime and its 1977 Surveying Victims. New York: Wiley. Impact—An Assessment, President’s Commission on U.S. Bureau of the Census Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice, 1970a ’Victim Recall Pretest (Washington, D.C.): Washington, 1967, p. 17. See also Biles, D. and Household Survey of Victims of Crime’. Mimeo- Braithwaite, J., ’Crime Victims and the Police’, Aus- graphed. Suitland, Md.: U.S. Bureau of the tralian Psychologist, (in press) which showed that Census, Demographic Surveys Division. 90.1% of motor vehicle thefts were reported to the U.S. Bureau of the Census police. This compares with a reportability rate of 1970b ’Household Survey of Victims of Crime: Second 42.1% for all offences in the survey. Pretest (Baltimore, Maryland)’. Mimeographed.

Downloaded from jos.sagepub.com at Australian National University on January 13, 2015 83 Suitland, Md.: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Demo- Behaviour and Norms graphic Surveys Division. Wilson, Paul R. and Brown, Jill Interaction between the workers was easy, 1973 Crime and the Community. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press. partly because of the low noise level, their proximity, their similarity on demographic variables, and the absence of supervisors. There were strong opportunities to sanction one another’s behaviour. The workers operated a system of job rotation by which each member in the section. The Work Group Behaviour in a New worked two days on each job Zealand origins of this practice were unknown. They Factory spent much of the day talking to each other about girls, sex, pool and drinking. One of them Roy McLennan and Tuck Liew said that if they did not talk a lot they would Department of Business Administration ’go insane or quit’, another that ’If you were to Victoria University of Wellington keep dumb the whole day, by the time you Wellington finished ... you’d really be buggered off’. They New Zealand interacted very little with other workers in the factory, and were united in a strong dislike of them. The other workers were at least Until the present time no empirical investi- typically ten older. gation of work group behaviour per se has been years carried out in New Zealand. The research re- The group practised a ’helping’ norm, i.e. to ported here was intended as an exploratory help the other worker when he was in trouble study, which would permit comparison with with his task. A ’mind your own business’ norm classic American and British research, and pro- circumscribed and limited the helping norm: a vide suggestive broad hypothesis for further worker should not help another unless asked to investigation. For these purposes a participant do so. The group restricted their expenditure of observer study of a work group was carried out energy on the section’s work. They handled five in a New Zealand cheese factory. vat loads of cheese each day, even when a larger number awaited their attention. They The Research Site anticipated work breaks by knocking off work ten minutes before lunch and morning and after- The site chosen for the research consisted of noon ’smokos’, walked away from the section the ’water removing’ section of the factory, together, and sat together in the canteen. They which was part of its processed cheese making manipulated the time they arrived at work by operation. The task of the employees working in fiddling with the timeclock, and rested, read and the section was to remove 16 lb blocks of cheese smoked in the cold room. Smoking in work from a battery of vats. place them on a con- areas of the factory was against the rules. To veyor, squeeze water and chemicals out of them protect the group from their supervisors they by rollers, and stack them in a cold room. The operated an early warning system to let them section’s output was relatively stable. Unloading know when a supervisor approached. Members the vats and cold room stacking was heavy. were posted on rotation as sentries, and sang repetitive work; watching the conveyor and the loudly when a supervisor appeared. The group rollers required steady observation, and occa- also observed norms concerning their off-job sional bursts of physical activity. The five em- behaviour. They went frequently to a particular ployees in the section worked within a relatively pub at lunch time, and gathered there in the confined space. They ranged in age from 18 to evenings and at weekends. At the pub they 25, four of them being between 18 and 22. Four drank, talked, and played pool. The group made had left school after two years of secondary up the factory’s pool team in a local competition. education; one was a university dropout. All of The work group coextended to the leisure group them were single, except the 25 year old, and and vice-versn. had worked in the section for a year or more. A foreman was formally responsible for the work of the section and three other sections in Discussion the processed cheese department. He appeared The norms of the group were functional for in the section only once a day, and spent nearly protecting it from the worst effects of highly all his time elsewhere. The factory manager repetitive, boring, monotonous work, most of showed the flag in most sections of the factory which had a job cycle time measurable in twice a day. Low wages were paid to the seconds. They alleviated the effects of the work workers, and there was no incentive scheme. by creating occasions for talk, for pursuing non-

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