NORC conference room meeting Handcuffs behind Back Judges gavel A NORC researcher uses a laptop in a meeting
Broken door Washington Monument in spring
View from NORC's Chicago Loop offices

Criminal Justice

A fair and effective justice system is part of the foundation of a successful society, affecting every American citizen, every day. Concerns about the enormous costs of the system exist alongside deep uncertainty about the efficacy of law enforcement and correctional strategies, and whether and how reform efforts can impact rehabilitation and improve public safety.

NORC’s 1966 landmark study, Criminal Victimization in the United States, was the predecessor to the annual National Crime Victimization Survey now conducted by the U.S. Census. Since then, NORC has consistently taken a comprehensive look at the justice system, examining the perspectives of its primary participants: institutions that oversee the administration of justice; crime victims and their experiences; those who commit crime; and the public that develops perceptions about crime and punishment.

In many cases, NORC’s work has explored instances where victimization occurs outside the criminal justice system. For example, studies on sexual behavior and human trafficking uncovered new types of victimization not often reported to police or addressed within the system. NORC launched a rigorous longitudinal study of middle school dating violence curriculum—a prevention-oriented extension of our expertise on victims. NORC has also surveyed prosecutors’ offices, prison re-entry programs, and a host of substance abuse and mental health issues with implications for the criminal justice system. The 2011 study, Dynamics of Methamphetamine Markets, exemplifies an interdisciplinary approach to problems where substance abuse and criminal activity are closely intertwined.  This innovative study was one of the first to consider all local stakeholders—dealers and users, as well as police and community leaders. It meshed interactive Internet-based tools with Drug Enforcement Agency file data to create a detailed, street-level understanding of the epidemic.

These innovations, our expertise with data collection in law enforcement agencies, and a sensitivity to incarcerated or victimized subjects enhances NORC’s core capabilities to develop new knowledge about the functions of the criminal justice system.
 
Specific areas of expertise include:
 

Representative Projects

Conversion of Criminal History Records into Research Databases (CCHRRD). For years, BJS has used information stored in the nation’s automated criminal history records to assess the officially-recognized, law-violating behavior of various samples of individuals.  To do recidivism studies, BJS has provided state criminal history repositories with identifying information on study subjects and has requested each participating state repository to extract selected information on each subject’s criminal justice activities, thus creating a reporting burden for participating repositories. In addition, the structure and content of the data extracted from these repositories varies from state to state requiring customized software to transform each state’s data into a commonly-formatted, researchable database.  In light of these challenges, only two national recidivism studies of released prisoners have been performed by BJS to date; the first in 1983 and the latest in 1994.  More

National Longitudinal Survey of Youth - 1997. The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor, is the youth-focused component of the National Longitudinal Survey Program used to gather information on the labor market experiences of American men and women.  More

Reintegration of Ex-Offenders Random Assignment Evaluation.

The Reintegration of Ex-Offenders Random Assignment Evaluation Study (RExO), funded by Department of Labor, is designed to provide a rigorous, random assignment evaluation of a demonstration program serving formerly incarcerated individuals through employment-centered programs. More

Social Ecology of Maternal Substance Use. Pregnancy is a key opportunity to affect the epidemiology and to enhance reduction of women’s tobacco and problem alcohol use. The opportunities to provide pregnant women with tobacco and alcohol cessation resources appear to be strongest when integrated into community-based health services, with attention to generating support in mothers’ networks of family and friends.  With support from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, this secondary data analyses project investigates the role of neighborhood structural aspects and social processes in association with maternal alcohol and tobacco use in the perinatal and early childhood parenting periods. More

The Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office): Developing a Brief Community Policing Self-Assessment Tool. This project will produce a brief self-assessment community policing instrument for police departments to evaluate their implementation of community policing.  This tool will facilitate internal planning, and inform training and management initiatives toward the full adoption of community policing. More

See all Criminal Justice projects

Headlines

News The Wall Street Journal: NLSY97 cited in determining the links between obesity and behavior More
Posted: 2.22.2012 4:42PM
Event Teen Dating Violence Intervention & Prevention, , Wednesday, February 29, 2012 More
Posted: 2.13.2012 1:38PM
News Reuters: "Fuzzy numbers on guns" with data and research from NORC More
Posted: 2.7.2012 2:46PM
News The Seattle Times: "Study: Nearly one in three arrested by age 26" featuring data from NLSY97 More
Posted: 1.17.2012 4:22PM
News The New York Times: "Many in U.S. Are Arrested by Age 23" with data from NLSY More
Posted: 12.19.2011 3:24PM

Contacts

Eric Goplerud

(301) 634-9525

Jeffrey Hackett

(312) 759-4266