CJ 261: Law Enforcement Research

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Class Program

Criminal Justice

Credits

Weekly Contact Hours

Course ID

092413

Meets Degree Requirements For

Restricted Elective

Description

Introduces concepts, approaches and methods for conducting and analyzing empirical research for criminal justice settings. Topics covered include: quantitative and qualitative research, surveying, sampling, data tabulation and assessing how to choose the appropriate method for specific law enforcement situations.

Grading Basis

Graded

Course Learning Outcomes

The student will be able to apply basic quantitative and qualitative research methods in law enforcement settings.

The student will be able to tabulate research data for law enforcement applications.

The student will be able to perform sampling and surveying research methods in law enforcement settings.

The student will be able to apply ethical standards and appropriate methods to generate objective research data to be used in accessing law enforcement situations.

Core Topics

Introduction to Criminal Justice Research Methods: Theory and Method
Ethics in Criminal Justice Research
Research Design: The Experimental Model and Its Variations
Alternative Data-Gathering Strategies and the Special Case of Uniform Crime Reports
Sampling and Survey Research: Questionnaires
Survey Research: Interviews and Telephone
Participant Observation and Case Studies
Unobtrusive Measures, Secondary Analysis, and the Uses for Official Statistics
Validity, Reliability and Triangulated Strategies
Scaling and Index Construction
Data Analysis: Coding, Tabulation and Simple Data Presentation