Criminology Report: Analyzing Crime Data from UCR and NCVS

This report provides a comparative analysis of the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) and the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) in the field of criminology. It examines how the data collected by these two methods varies in terms of crime rates, highlighting the differences in their collection methodologies. The UCR, managed by the FBI, primarily focuses on crimes reported to law enforcement, while the NCVS, administered by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, surveys households to gather data on victimization experiences, including both reported and unreported crimes. The report explores the similarities between the UCR and NCVS, such as the measurement of certain serious crimes. It also discusses the key differences, including the types of crimes covered, the populations surveyed, and the impact of these differences on the reported crime rates. The analysis includes the limitations of each method, and the conclusions summarize the strengths and weaknesses of each approach in capturing the nature and magnitude of crime.

Running head: CRIMINOLOGY
Criminology
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

1CRIMINOLOGY
Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
NCVS and UCR and the data collection variation in terms of crime rates.....................................2
Similarities between the UCR and NCVS.......................................................................................3
Differences between UCR and NCVS.............................................................................................3
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................4
Reference.........................................................................................................................................5

2CRIMINOLOGY
Introduction
UCR or the Uniform Crime Reports are the official crime data for United States and it is
officially published by Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). While Bureau of Justice Statistics
administer the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). The NCVS is a national level
survey of over 77,400 households and it released twice in a year in United States. Themes on
which the survey is released consists of the consequences and characteristics of victimization,
frequency of crime victimization (Langton, Planty & Lynch, 2017). This study will emphasize on
how the information collected varies in terms of crime rate between the NCVS and UCR; how
both NCVS and UCR are similar and what are the probable differences between the two.
NCVS and UCR and the data collection variation in terms of crime rates
In case of UCR the some of the crimes misses the attention of the people that are having
the responsibility of collecting the information. This mainly targets the law enforcement agencies
that have the responsibility of collecting the information of the crime site. The UCR mainly
focuses on the street crime which includes the robbery and assaults. While it does not take into
account off the serious crimes pertaining to the corporate crime. This can be justified by the fact
that the investigation and prosecution are given less priority by the federal government and it
even includes the crime statistics. UCR is often used for the political purposes and some even
point that the statistics are just a social construction (McDevitt & Iwama, 2016). The statistics
are merely used for policy and program purposes. Some of the law enforcement agencies even
submit delinquent and incomplete reports. Issues in UCR data collection can occur at the clerical
level and also due to errors in data processing. Changes in the legal code also makes the
comparisons based on the previous crime reports difficult.

3CRIMINOLOGY
In case of NCVS, the crimes like gambling, dealing, drug and prostitution often do not
get revealed from the interviews. The rationale is that the murder victims cannot be considered
for the interview and due to this NCVS does not include such crimes. Furthermore, the NCVS
does not take into account of the situation in which the individual is victimized by drug abuse,
procuring, sexual soliciting, impaired driving, disturbance of peace and drunkenness. The NCVS
surveys the crime incidents taken place inside a household and it does not take into account of
the crimes committed in the commercial buildings (Us.sagepub.com, 2019).
Similarities between the UCR and NCVS
Both the UCR and NCVS are designed by the US Department of Justice administers and
due to this both UCR and NCVS have similarities. In terms of collection methods, both the UCR
and NCVS measure the same subsets of serious crimes and both of them include motor vehicle
theft, theft, burglary, aggravated assault, robbery, rape. While it is important to note that the
motor vehicle theft, theft, robbery and rape are defined identically in NCVS and UCR (Ansari &
He, 2015).
Differences between UCR and NCVS
The fist and the foremost differences between the two programs is that they serve for
different purposes. The main objective of UCR is to facilitate criminal justice statistics for the
agencies that enforce, manages, operates and administers law. While the NCVS objective is to
provide the previously available information on offenders, victims and crime. The second major
difference between the two programs is that they measure non-identical and overlapping set of
crimes. NCVS includes the data of crime that are both unreported and reported to the law
enforcement. Although UCR includes crimes against children that are aged 12, commercial
crimes, arson, homicide, but NCVS excludes the same. While the UCR collects only the data for

4CRIMINOLOGY
sexual and simple assault and captures the crimes that are reported to the law enforcement. Due
to the differences in the methodology of data collection, some of the crimes also differ. The
property crimes that includes the motor vehicle theft, theft and burglary are calculated by both
the UCR and NCVS but different bases are used. NCVS calculates the rates fir the crimes
happening per household, while UCR calculates the rates happening per capita (Ucrdatatool.gov,
2019).
Conclusion
From the above discussion it can be concluded that both the NCVS and the UCR are the
framed by the US Department of Justice administers. They both are the statistical programs that
measure the impact of the crime, nature of the crime and magnitude of the crime occurring in the
area.

5CRIMINOLOGY
Reference
Ansari, S., & He, N. (2015). Convergence Revisited: A Multi-Definition, Multi-Method Analysis
of the UCR and the NCVS Crime Series (1973-2008). Justice Quarterly, 32(1), 1-31.
Langton, L., Planty, M., & Lynch, J. P. (2017). Second major redesign of the National Crime
Victimization Survey (NCVS). Criminology & Public Policy, 16(4), 1049-1074.
McDevitt, J., & Iwama, J. (2016). Challenges in measuring and understanding hate crime. The
handbook of measurement issues in criminology and criminal justice, 131-156.
Ucrdatatool.gov. (2019). Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics. Retrieved from
https://www.ucrdatatool.gov/twomeasures.cfm
Us.sagepub.com. (2019). Measuring Crime. Retrieved from
https://us.sagepub.com/sites/default/files/upm-binaries/80743_Chapter_2.pdf