Explaining Crime » Patterns of Crime and Victimisation

Who commits crime, and who suffers it?

Sociologists do not just ask what crime is. They ask who is involved. Official statistics and victim surveys show that some groups appear in the figures far more than others, both as people who commit crime and as people who are harmed by it.

These are patterns, not rules. They describe groups, not every person in them. Most young people, most men and most people from every ethnic group and class never commit a serious crime.

Key terms:

• Offender: a person who commits a crime, or is recorded as having done so.
• Victimisation: being the victim of a crime.
• Over-represented: appearing in the figures in a bigger share than the group's share of the population.

Age

In most societies, offending in the official figures is highest among teenagers and young adults. It then falls as people get older. Many young people commit minor offences, such as vandalism or shoplifting, and then stop as they take on jobs, partners and children.

Young people are also more likely to be victims. In victim surveys, people in their late teens and twenties report more violent crime than older groups. Older people are less likely to be victims of most crimes, but they are often targeted by fraud and scams. They may also fear crime more than their real risk suggests.

Social class

Official statistics show that people from poorer, working-class backgrounds are over-represented among those arrested, convicted and sent to prison. The crimes in these figures are mostly street crimes such as theft, burglary and violence.

Crimes of better-off people, such as fraud and tax evasion, make up a small share of the figures. They are harder to detect and are less often prosecuted, so we cannot say better-off people commit less crime.

Victimisation shows a pattern too. People who live in poorer areas, in many societies, report more burglary and violent crime than people who live in wealthier areas.

Gender

This is the clearest pattern in the figures. In almost every society, far more men than women are recorded as offenders, and men carry out most violent crime. Women make up a small share of those convicted. When women are convicted, it is more often for minor property crimes such as shoplifting.

Victimisation is different. Men are more likely to be victims of violence from strangers, often in public places and at night. Women are more likely to be victims of domestic abuse and sexual crimes, which are often committed by someone they know. These crimes are among the least likely to be reported.

Ethnicity

In some countries, people from some ethnic minority groups are over-represented in stop and search, arrests and prison, compared with their share of the population. The pattern is not the same in every country or for every minority group.

In victim surveys, people from some ethnic minority groups report more hate crime and a higher risk of some violent crimes. The reasons for each pattern are taught in later lessons. For now you only need to describe what the figures show.

Can we trust the patterns?

Remember the lesson Measuring Crime: official statistics only show crime that is reported to the police and recorded. They do not show every crime that happens.

That matters here. If the police patrol certain areas or stop certain groups more often, those groups will appear more in the figures. Whole kinds of crime, such as white-collar crime and domestic abuse, are less likely to be recorded. Victim surveys help, but people can forget, misunderstand or choose not to say what happened.

So the patterns may show who is caught and recorded as much as who offends. Always say the figures "suggest" or "show" a pattern, never that they prove who commits crime.

Exam-style question

(a) Define the term victimisation. [2 marks]

(b) Describe three patterns of crime or victimisation shown by official statistics and victim surveys. [6 marks]