Research Article Analysis
CJA/334
05/02/2016

Introduction

There are many research studies that are done covering a variety of issues across the country, knowing how to dissect a research article is a great way to learn new information while honing your own research skills. In this paper, we're going to look a research study from a professional journal that has been peer-reviewed, along with answering various questions about the data collected, results of the study and design of the study. The study we're using is: Exploratory Study of the Relationship between Poverty and Crimes in Albany/Dougherty, Georgia by Nwaokoro, Amaechi N., Marshall, Clifford, Mittal, Shiwam, Journal of Business & Economics Research, 2013.

Purpose of the Study

For many communities it's easy to say the worse parts of town breed crime. Poor people are the ones who break the laws, they're the ones that need to be kept away from the higher class citizens. Is this really true? In some communities, it just may be. The purpose of this study was to determine if in fact poverty causes crime. Does a person's financial state and area of housing cause push that person into a life of crime? Another purpose of the study is to show if the area in question, Albany/Dougherty Georgia, had over time seen their crime rates rise as the population rose.

Design of the study

The design of the study is the Case Study Design, where a number of different factors are studied in the process of determining if poverty affected crime rates. One of the studies focused on explaining the rise of crime rates on financial motives. One example of this a person sees a car they know they can't afford, so they plot to and eventually do steal the car. Another study focused on single mothers who were of low education, and unable to raise their children to stay away from crime. The study suggested that sons in particular from single mothers are more likely to participate in crimes.

Operational definition used by the researchers

The operational definition used in this study was a collection of the income level of the people in the area, alongside the unemployment rate and rate of crimes from people who lived in said area. By showing the amount of people who live below the poverty level, along with those that are unemployed and have broken the law, researchers are able to get a more clear definition of who's breaking the law and what income level those people live at.

One example of inductive logic and deductive logic

One deductive logic example from the article is from aggregate data, demographic factors of the offspring of single mothers and teenage fertility are used to predict the amount of people participating in criminal venues. Ultimately the demographics proved the propensity of these people to end up committing property and violent crimes.

One example of induction logic from the article is that big businesses that have moved away from the county have contributed to the lack of jobs and rise in poverty for the people in these communities. They name Firestone, the US Naval Air Station, and Merck Pharmaceuticals as businesses that have moved away and therefore taken jobs away from the county. This in turn means poverty goes up, and crime goes up due to the poverty.

Quantitative or qualitative design study

The study is both quantitative and qualitative. It's qualitative because the researcher is digging into the data that's available and discovering more data as the study continues forward, gather from various works over a long range of time to reach the results. It's also quantitative because all aspects of the study are carefully designed before the data comes in. The researchers know what they need to collect, unemployment rates, the poverty level, education issues, and households with single parents and what the local economy is like.

Methodology, population, sampling methods, and return rate

The methodology used to gain the results of the study is data gathering from a number of sources. The crimes, unemployment rate, and average weekly wages were obtained from the Georgia department of Labor. The Georgia Department of Corrections provided the incarceration rates of men, women, and the race of each. The Dougherty County Public School System provided the dropout rates of students, along with race and sex. These numbers are reflected in a table that allows for all data to be studied and analyzed.
Findings of the study

The graduation rate coupled with incarceration, teenage pregnancies and unemployment have allowed the wage rate in the county to decline. This means anyone that gets a job will not make a livable wage, and keep them remain in poverty.

With a decrease in a demand for labor (i.e. jobs) there is a rise in crime, due to people not having something to occupy their time or afford them the monies needed to buy what they need and want. This in turn means people will be out committing crimes, not only to get what they want/need, but because they simply have nothing else to do with their time.

Author’s conclusions and recommendations.

The Dougherty County School System needs to figure out how to help keep students in school and graduate. New county polices designed to bring in business, allowing for more job available would help people raise their poverty level and put money back into the economy. Jobs would also give people more to do then commit crimes, while affording them the money to get the things they need to keep them from stealing or robbing. Felons need proper education to help themselves after being released from prison, allowing them to re-enter into society, find work and not re-offend.

Could the study have been done differently or improved?

In this writer’s opinion, the study encompasses everything needed to dig into the question of poverty and its effect on crime. The study brings in numerous factors, unemployment, living wage, educational issues, teen pregnancies, single parent homes and incarceration rates. It also details businesses leaving the area and its effect on the job market, which in turn affects the poverty level and crime rate.

Conclusion

It can be hard at times to pour over search results to determine how the results were found, measured and reported. By being able to break down each part of a study it becomes clearer how the each part of the study feeds into the overall results. It also allows for a greater appreciation of the time it takes to do the research and the ability it takes to read the results and report the findings, which in turn can give people ways of improving the issues at hand.