Gun Violence in the United States: Moving Beyond the Preoccupation with Location and Mental Health

Project Overview

This project is a quantitative analysis of gun violence in the United States which will examine the various legal, criminal, social, political, and economic factors that contribute to gun crimes. The research team will be compiling data on gun crimes from various existing databases and adding information to test variables often ignored in typical analyses by members of the public, media and government. The findings from this study will be used to advocate for better policies and public education on the matter of gun violence as well as used to inform improved law enforcement training to improve the profession's knowledge for prevention and threat assessment purposes. The impact of gun violence on our nation has been unfortunately part of our lives here in the North Country. After acts of gun violence, communities often ask questions regarding the motivations for the crime and seek solutions to prevent such acts from occurring again. While there is a wealth of empirical information about gun violence, these studies often suffer from methodological and theoretical deficiencies that prevent a more holistic understanding of gun violence in the U.S. and therefore hinder responses to the problem at various levels.