Statistical correlations of criminal behaviour
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The field of criminology studies the frequency and dynamics of crime. Most of these studies use correlational data; that is, they attempt to identify various factors which tend to be related to the frequency of different categories of crime behavior. From such correlational studies, a large number of theories have been proposed for explaining the causes of these crimes. Such attempts to identify specific causes of crime must be read very critically since correlation does not imply causation.
The Handbook of Crime Correlates (2009) is a systematic review of 5200 empirical studies on crime which have been published in the worldwide academic literature. A crime consistency score is used to represent the degree of relationship among the factors which were studied. The scoring depends on how consistently a statistically significant relationship was identified. The authors argue that the review summaries most of what is currently known about the variables associated with criminality.
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