« Previous | Contents | Next »
Listen
CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION
1.1 The 2006 Scottish Crime and Victimisation Survey ( SCVS) was a large scale household survey of the Scottish public's experiences and perceptions of crime, involving interviews with a sample of 4,988 adults (aged 16 or over) throughout the whole of mainland Scotland and the larger islands. The 2006 SCVS provides measures of the crimes that took place during the financial year immediately prior to fieldwork; that is between the beginning of April 2005 and the end of March 2006.
1.2 The main aims of the SCVS (as for previous crime surveys in Scotland) were:
- To provide a measure of crime in Scotland that is complementary to police recorded statistics;
- To examine the trends in the extent and nature of crime over time;
- To examine the risk of becoming a victim to crime; and
- To collect information on a number of crime-related issues (e.g. concern about crime; attitudes to the police and violence in the workplace).
1.3 Throughout this report, the term 'crime' is used to refer to any incident cited in the survey in which the respondent was the victim. No technical distinction is made between 'crimes' and 'offences', as is the case with police recorded crime statistics.
Background
1.4 This is the eighth in a series of crime surveys in Scotland. In 1982 and 1988, Scotland participated in sweeps of the British Crime Survey ( BCS) co-ordinated by the Home Office. However, data collection was restricted to central and southern Scotland and therefore excluded the experiences of those living in the Highlands and Islands. In 1993, the Scottish Office commissioned the first independent Scottish Crime Survey ( SCS) which extended coverage to the whole of mainland Scotland together with the larger islands. Sweeps of the survey in this format were then repeated in 1996, 2000 and 2003. Interviews with around 5,000 adults were achieved at each sweep of the survey and were administered by interviewers, face-to-face with respondents, using paper questionnaires.
1.5 In 2004 the survey was re-launched as the Scottish Crime and Victimisation Survey ( SCVS). Interviews were carried out via telephone with 27,500 adults between June 2004 and March 2006. In order to assess the impact of the switch in methodology a face-to-face survey was run in tandem with the telephone survey which replicated the design of the previous sweeps of the survey (albeit with a smaller sample size of c.3000). However, after the calibration exercise and on the recommendation of the SCVS Technical Group, including independent peer review, it was found that the robustness of data from the telephone survey could not be substantiated, and the survey was discontinued after one year. It was agreed that subsequent survey sweeps would revert to a face-to-face interviewing mode 2.
1.6 It was decided that a SCVS would be conducted in 2006 face-to-face with a sample size of 5,000, as an interim measure prior to the re-launch of the survey on a larger sample size, in 2007.
1.7 Previous sweeps of the survey have been carried out on paper, but for the 2006 survey respondents were interviewed using Computer Aided Personal Interviewing ( CAPI).
Purpose and Limitations of Crime Surveys
1.8 One of the main functions of crime surveys is that they provide a complementary index of crime compared with police recorded crime statistics. For a variety of reasons, not all incidents of victimisation are reported to, or recorded by, the police. In addition, police recorded crime statistics have been affected by changes in policing policy and police recording practice (for example, a 'zero tolerance' campaign will result in more crime being recorded).
1.9 In April 2004 a new Scottish Crime Recording Standard was introduced by the police. It was anticipated that this would increase the number of minor crimes recorded by police, such as vandalism and theft. Such changes to recording practices obviously need to be borne in mind when looking at trends over time in overall recorded crime.
1.10 Crime surveys can overcome some of these limitations and provide a more complete picture of victimisation levels by including incidents that are not reported to or not recorded by the police. By repeating the survey using the same methodology, trend information can be produced that is comparable year on year.
1.11 However, crime surveys are not without their limitations, which are mainly a factor of the available methodology for such work, and the SCVS is no exception. The SCVS does not provide a complete picture of crime in Scotland. It is a survey of adults living in private households and therefore does not provide information on crimes against people living in other circumstances (for example those in hostels or care homes); those under the age of 16; and crimes against businesses (for example, shoplifting).
1.12 Another limitation of the SCVS is that it is not a perfectly reliable measure of crime. As with any survey, the results can only represent the experience of the people in the sample who take part; if the experiences of those who cannot be contacted, or who refuse to take part, are different from those who are interviewed, and this cannot be corrected by weighting, then the survey will not reflect the experiences of the people of Scotland as a whole. There may also be errors in the recall of participants as to when certain incidents took place, resulting in some crimes being wrongly included in or excluded from the reference period. It is also possible that public perceptions of crime and victimisation may change over time, and result in changes in how people report crime from survey to survey.
1.13 Apart from these possible sources of inaccuracy, the SCVS results, like the results of other sample-based surveys, are subject to sampling error. To indicate the extent of this error, the key results presented in this report are given with their calculated confidence intervals. These are bands within which we can be 95 per cent confident that the 'true' value lies.
1.14 In spite of these limitations the results of this survey provide the best available indicator of levels and trends in victimisation in Scotland.
The Survey
1.15 In total 4,988 interviews were conducted with adults aged 16 or over between June 2006 and December 2006. Respondents were asked for the details of any crimes they had experienced between the 1st April 2005 and the date of their interview. However, the victimisation rates presented in this report relate only to crimes which took place in the 12 months between April 2005 and March 2006. This is comparable to the 2004 SCVS, which reported on the period between April 2003 and March 2004, although previous sweeps of the SCS were based on calendar years.
1.16 The general structure of the interview is detailed in Annex 2. The questionnaire was primarily based on the previous sweeps of the survey.
1.17 The response rate for the 2006 survey was 70.5 per cent (a full breakdown of the response rate calculation is shown in Annex Table B1). This was a higher response rate than was achieved in both of the previous 2 face-to-face surveys: the 2003 SCS (68%) and the 2004 face-to-face SCVS (67.3%).
1.18 Further details of the survey methodology are contained in Annex 2.
The Report
1.19 This report presents the findings from the 2006 SCVS on crimes which took place between April 2005 and March 2006. The structure of the report is as follows:
- Chapter 2 contains estimates of the extent of crime and victimisation in Scotland for this period.
- Chapter 3 looks at the experience of victims, focusing on the unequal risks of being a victim of crime across key demographic variables; where, when and why incidents took place; reporting of incidents to the police and subsequent experience of the Criminal Justice System; the impact that crime has had on those who have been victims; and access to support.
- Chapter 4 explores public attitudes towards crime; worry about crime; perceptions of levels of crime in both the local area and Scotland as a whole; and experience of the police and the Criminal Justice System.
- Annex 1 contains detailed tabulations of the data discussed in the report. Annex 2 details the SCVS methodology. Annex 3 provides sampling error and design factors for key survey estimates. Annex 4 provides a note on comparing SCVS estimates of crime with police recorded crime figures. Annex 5 explains the Scottish ACORN classification and Annex 6 provides a glossary of terms used throughout the report.
1.20 Results from the 2 self-completion modules that formed part of the survey (on partner abuse and drug use) are reported separately 3.
Methodological Note
1.21 One of the key aims of the SCVS is to measure the level and type of victimisation experienced by the Scottish public. From the SCVS data it is possible to calculate 3 main indicators of the level of crime:
- Incidence rates (or victimisation rates). Incidence rates are the number of crimes reported in the SCVS, expressed as a rate per 10,000 units. Units can be individuals, households or motor vehicle or bicycle owning households. For example, the rate of housebreaking (including attempted housebreaking) is 282 incidents per 10,000 households. Incidence rates are a more precise indication of changes in crime between surveys because, unlike population totals, they are not affected by changing population or household numbers.
- Estimates of the total number of crimes in the population. These are simply the incidence rates grossed up to reflect the estimates for the total population, using projected population estimates. These are used within the report to show the extent of crime in Scotland and as a basis for comparisons with police recorded crime.
- Prevalence rates. These show the percentage of individuals or households who have experienced a specific crime at least once. Prevalence rates can be interpreted as the 'risk' of being victim of a particular crime within a certain period. For example, 2% of households had experienced an incident of housebreaking (or attempted housebreaking) in 2005/6. It is also possible to use prevalence rates to analyse the way in which the risk of being victim of a particular crime varies between different groups of the population.
A Note on Interpretation of Results
1.22 Unless otherwise stated, all data included in this report on the proportion of households /individuals / incidents are weighted to reflect the population. When raw numbers are given (in the form, 'n='), these are unweighted. Details of the weighting process are given in Annex 2.
1.23 As a general rule only results that are statistically different at the 95% confidence level are commented upon in the text. In other words, we can be 95% sure that any differences observed are not the result of chance. Statistical tests such as 2-tailed t-tests were carried out where appropriate.
1.24 The sample size of the survey is the minimum deemed necessary to monitor trends in the main indicators of crime. However, estimates derived from sub-sets of the data become less reliable and the accuracy with which trends in lower-volume crimes such as robbery can be identified is fairly limited. Subsequent sweeps of the survey will employ a larger sample size to improve the ability of the survey measures to monitor statistically different changes in rarer crimes.
1.25 Grossed population estimates and victimisation rates per 10,000 households/individuals have been presented in the Annexes. Tables show the grossed estimate based on the survey percentage ("best estimate"), as well as an "upper" and "lower" estimate for each figure, based on 95% confidence intervals.
1.26 Tables in the Annexes show grossed estimates to the nearest unit (e.g. 329,362 violent crimes); in the main body of the report, grossed estimates of victimisation rates have been rounded to the nearest thousand (e.g. 320,000 violent crimes) for ease of comprehension.
1.27 Estimates of the total number of crimes in Scotland have been compared with official police-recorded statistics. However, these have been adjusted to allow comparability with the SCVS (for example excluding crimes against public and corporately owned property and crimes against victims under 16 years of age). This is explained in more detail in Annex 4.
« Previous | Contents | Next »