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2015•Crime Media Culture An International JournalOpen access

Measuring copycat crime

Ray Surette

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Abstract

Copycat crimes have not been identified or measured in a coherent manner. To forward the study of copycat crime, a methodology was developed to empirically score crimes that are suspected of being copycat crimes on a scale from “unsubstantiated” to “substantiated”. The copycat crime measure utilized seven factors culled from the extant literature to differentiate and score a demonstration set of 51 candidate copycat crimes associated with commercial entertainment films. Two examples of analysis and research questions that can be subsequently pursued utilizing the scoring approach are provided. A means of measuring copycat crime will provide interested researchers the capability to examine research questions related to copycat crime trends, media content and copycat crime, social media and copycat crime, and different types of copycat crime.

About this research paper

What this paper is about

Copycat crimes have not been identified or measured in a coherent manner. To forward the study of copycat crime, a methodology was developed to empirically score crimes that are suspected of being copycat crimes on a scale from “unsubstantiated” to “substantiated”. The copycat crime measure utilized seven factors culled from the extant literature to differentiate and score a demonstration set of 51 candidate copycat crimes associated with commercial entertainment films. Two examples of analysis and research questions that can be subsequently pursued utilizing the scoring approach are provided. A means of measuring copycat crime will provide interested researchers the capability to examine research questions related to copycat crime trends, media content and copycat crime, social media and copycat crime, and different types of copycat crime.

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Available abstract

Copycat crimes have not been identified or measured in a coherent manner. To forward the study of copycat crime, a methodology was developed to empirically score crimes that are suspected of being copycat crimes on a scale from “unsubstantiated” to “substantiated”. The copycat crime measure utilized seven factors culled from the extant literature to differentiate and score a demonstration set of 51 candidate copycat crimes associated with commercial entertainment films. Two examples of analysis and research questions that can be subsequently pursued utilizing the scoring approach are provided. A means of measuring copycat crime will provide interested researchers the capability to examine research questions related to copycat crime trends, media content and copycat crime, social media and copycat crime, and different types of copycat crime.

Key concepts: Copycat, Criminology, Extant taxon, Psychology, Political science, Evolutionary biology, Biology, Cognitive science

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