Surveying Victims Options for Conducting the National Crime Victimization Survey (2008) / Chapter Skim
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Appendix C: Procedures and Operations of the National Crime Victimization Survey
Appendix C: Procedures and Operations of the National Crime Victimization Survey
Pages 153-170
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From page 153... ...
"has a national sample of approximately 56,000 designated addresses located in approximately 673 primary sampling units throughout the United States" (Demographic Surveys Division, U.S. Census Bureau, 2007b)
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From page 154... ...
With respect to the group quarters coverage of the NCVS sample, it is important to note that BJS and the Census Bureau exclude some major types of nonhousehold, group quarters types from eligibility in the survey. In particular, "institutionalized persons, such as correctional facility inmates," are not included in the NCVS, nor are seaborne personnel on merchant vessels or armed forces personnel living in barracks.
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From page 155... ...
may provide the requested information.3 C–1.c Sample Size Over Time Table C-1 shows the number of sample households and the number of persons contacted in those households for the most recent years for which NCVS data are available. The table also illustrates the decline in NCVS sample size over time.
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From page 156... ...
. Figure C-1 Year-to-year change in NCVS violent crime victimization rate, 1993–2005 NOTE: Boxes denote the 95 percent confidence interval for each year's victimization rate.
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The NCVS Resource Guide maintained by the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data4 summarizes the basic issues and inherent trade-offs in designating a particular reference period as follows: Generally, respondents are able to recall more accurately an event which occurred within three months of the interview rather than one which occurred within six months; they can recall events over a six-month pe riod more accurately than over a 12-month period. However, a shorter reference period would require more field interviews per year, increas ing the data collection costs significantly.
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From page 158... ...
. The ruled box denotes months that would be used for data-year estimates for year t (collecting interviews where incidents occurred in year t )
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From page 159... ...
As part of a package of revisions to cover NCVS costs for three years, BJS and the Census Bureau decided to suspend the use of the Census Bureau CATI centers for the NCVS. However, this covers only the formal CATI interviews from the designated call centers, which is to say that "informal" telephone interviewing -- with Census Bureau field representatives calling households in their designated workloads to complete interviews by phone -- is still employed (and encouraged)
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From page 160... ...
, responses to the NCVS are not required by law, and households are advised of the voluntary nature of the survey, in compliance with federal privacy laws. C–2.c Bounding A common concern of researchers employing reference periods in retrospective surveys is telescoping.
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From page 161... ...
C–3 STRUCTURE OF THE NCVS INSTRUMENT AND INTERVIEW In the sections that follow, we generally describe the features of the NCVS instrument and the progress of an NCVS interview through reference to the most recent versions of the survey in paper-and-pencil format. After several years of work, the NCVS is now fully implemented through computer-assisted means, with interviewers using laptop computers to administer the interviews (or, until their abandonment, with interviews conducted from Census Bureau–operated telephone call centers)
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From page 162... ...
. The household respondent is the first person interviewed and is the only person in the household who is asked about "thefts of certain kinds of things that are considered the common property of the household," including questions about "burglary, motor vehicle theft, and the theft of specific household property such as plants or lawn furniture" (Cantor and Lynch, 2000:95)
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" and is allowed to briefly describe the incident. After the bank of screening questions is complete, interviewers are directed to go through an Incident Report -- described in the next section -- for each category for which the number of reported incidents is greater than zero.
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• Following a question on the total number of motor vehicles owned by the household, Q39a: During the last 6 months, (other than any incidents already mentioned,) (was the vehicle/were any of the vehicles)
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Any other person you've met or known? • Q43a: Incidents involving forced or unwanted sexual acts are often difficult to talk about.
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From page 166... ...
After the screening questions are complete and before a respondent is asked a set of questions about their employment, the NCVS interviewing protocol is to complete an Incident Report for each victimization incident counted by the screening questions. "For example, if a respondent said that his pocket was picked once and he was beaten up twice, three Crime Incident Reports, one for each separate incident, are completed" (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2007a:10)
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From page 167... ...
of households in the NCVS sample complete the full set of seven interviews. C–4 SUPPLEMENTS TO THE NCVS Topical supplements that have been added to the NCVS have included (Demographic Surveys Division, U.S.
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From page 168... ...
The supplement contains questions on preventative measures employed by the school to deter crime; students' participation in extracurricular activities; transportation to and from school; students' perception of rules and equality in school; bullying and hate crime in school; the presence of street gangs in school; availability of drugs and alcohol in the school; attitudinal questions relating to the fear of victimization in school; access to firearms; and student characteristics such as grades received in school and postgraduate plans. Specifically, for the 2005 implementation of the supplement, "approximately 10,000 households containing approximately 11,600 respondents were eligible for the supplement from January through June 2005." The school crime questions were administered to all individual respondents in the sample households who were between ages 12 and 18, "who were enrolled in primary or secondary education programs leading to a high school diploma, and who were enrolled in school sometime during the six months prior to the interview." The School Crime Supplement is distinct from the Schools Survey on Crime and Safety, sponsored by the National Center for Education Statistics and conducted by the Census Bureau, which is a periodic, nationally representative cross-sectional survey of public elementary and secondary schools (administered to principals)
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From page 169... ...
The U.S. Census Bureau interviewers administered the supplemental interview to all people within these households who are 18 years of age or older and whose NCVS interview was conducted by self-response" (Demographic Surveys Division, U.S.
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