The Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at the University of Colorado at Boulder is a source of information on gun violence and gun control prevention efforts during Charlton Heston's March 21 visit to the CU-Boulder campus.
Professional Research Assistant Tonya Aultman-Bettridge can take calls on the gun control issue at the violence prevention center at (303) 492-1032 on Tuesday, March 21, and Thursday, March 23.
Aultman-Bettridge was a co-author of a May 1999 report on preventing youth handgun violence funded by The Colorado Trust. The report was conducted by the CU-Boulder Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence and the CU-Denver Center for Public-Private Sector Cooperation.
A two-page position summary on gun control prevention efforts prepared by the violence prevention center is attached.
For more information contact the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence at (303) 492-1032, visit the center's Web site at or contact Peter Caughey in the CU-Boulder Office of News Services at (303) 492-4007.
CU-Boulder Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence Position Summary
Gun Control Prevention Efforts
Research on the effectiveness of gun control laws is inconsistent. In part, the research reflects the heated ideological debate between those supporting gun control and those opposing it. Both sides of the issue have published articles citing that either gun control does in fact reduce violence or gun control does not reduce violence.
A major problem for those in support of gun control is proving the efficacy of gun control laws. These laws are extremely difficult to evaluate. First of all, the nature of law impedes implementing a controlled experiment in which random cities are assigned to pass specific laws and "control" cities are required to have no gun control laws (which would involve overturning existing laws). In addition, laws generally are very difficult to evaluate due to differential enforcement practices in different districts and states.
Evaluation research has demonstrated that most gun control laws are poorly enforced due primarily to a lack of resources and the inability of law officials to meet the new legal requirements without an expanded institutional capacity.
Further complications for evaluating gun control laws include controlling for outside contamination from other nearby cities. For instance, if Denver passed a strict gun control law there is no way to keep guns from nearby cities from filtering in and, therefore, an inability of knowing what kind of effect those guns (contamination) would have on the experiment. Gun control effectiveness is also obscured by evidence of a displacement effect, that is, while gun related crimes decline in the targeted area, they often increase in nearby areas in which the gun laws do not exist. The location of these crimes has shifted, but the overall number or rate has not changed.
The evidence for gun control, therefore, is based almost totally on non-experimental research that limits our knowledge and understanding of gun control efficacy.
References
Kleck, G. (1991). Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Roth, J.A. (1994). Firearms and Violence. National Institute of Justice, Research in Brief. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice.
Wright, J.D. (1995, March). Ten Essential Observations on Guns in America. Social Research and Public Policy, 63-68.
For a comprehensive listing of research relating to the effects of gun control laws and other gun-related legislation see:
Robinson, K.D., Vernick, J.S., & Teret, S.P. (1997). Firearm Violence: An Annotated Bibliography. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research. (This publication may be obtained through the Johns Hopkins center for Gun Policy Research, School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, 21205-1996, (410) 955-3995.)
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