{"id":177,"date":"2019-11-07T14:55:06","date_gmt":"2019-11-07T14:55:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/?p=177"},"modified":"2019-11-07T15:01:51","modified_gmt":"2019-11-07T15:01:51","slug":"household-gun-ownership-and-homicide-rates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/post-1-spring-2019\/household-gun-ownership-and-homicide-rates\/","title":{"rendered":"Household Gun Ownership and Homicide Rates"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A. Whalen <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The National Rifle Association\u2019s commonly acknowledged stance is that \u201cthe only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun\u201d(NPR, 2012). However, what this claim does not reconcile is the idea that regardless of which \u2018guy\u2019 has a gun in this scenario, the most likely outcome is violence from one or both ends. Handguns seem to be a major component of this gun violence, as they are easily concealable and used in 86% of violent crime. A 2002 study conducted by Matthew Miller and his colleagues interrogated the relationship between handgun ownership and homicide data as reported by the National Center for Health Statistics from data covering a 9 year span. The results demonstrated a positive correlation between handgun ownership and reported homicide, indicating that increased handgun ownership does not result in fewer gun mortalities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Graph<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The data figure details the relationship between gun\/non-gun related homicides and handgun ownership using an Incident Ratio Rate. The Incident Ratio Rate measures the percent change in the homicide rate for a standard percent increase in gun ownership. The measure of household gun ownership is hard to accurately estimate, however, this study pulled from the General Social Survey (GSS) which is acknowledged as the best method for estimation. The data demonstrates a statistically significant increase in homicide rates relative to increase in handgun ownership, shown by p-values < 0.05. One could refute the data stating that there is only correlation, not causation; the increase in homicides could\u2019ve led to more gun purchasing. Yet, regardless of which factor influences the other, a correlation between more violence and more guns is significant–it contradicts the claim that more guns will lead to a safer community. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This study demonstrates the correlation between household handgun ownership and homicides, both gun and non-gun related. With a standard increase in handgun ownership, there is a consistent ~1% increase in homicide rates. This correlation is important because it provides grounds to say that more guns, whether in the hands of a decidedly \u201cgood\u201d or \u201cbad\u201d guy, do not result in fewer deaths. If we are looking to reduce overall gun mortalities, limiting handgun purchases is a good place to start. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

*Miller et al., 2002 American Journal of Public Health<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A. Whalen The National Rifle Association\u2019s commonly acknowledged stance is that \u201cthe only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun\u201d(NPR, 2012). […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":178,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-post-1-spring-2019","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":180,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177\/revisions\/180"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digitalprojects.davidson.edu\/writingscience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}