Term Paper Assignment CRIJ 3300 Applied Research and Methods 9 Pages Introduction In the American Criminal Justice System, many young adults commit delinquency acts. In this paper, the goal of this research is to find out if the use of any controlled substance or any illegal drug incite male juveniles in high school delinquency. I hypothesize that if male juveniles that attend high school consume any controlled substances or illegal drug, then their crime commission or delinquency rates will increase. If male juveniles that attend high school commit crime or delinquency acts, and they do not consume controlled substances or illegal drugs, their crime rates will go down or remain the same. Population of Interest For this research, the population of interest will be male juveniles of American nationality who attend a public high school in Chicago, Illinois. Unit of Analysis The unit of analysis proposed to analyze for this research will be individuals. Individual students who get studied in a research can be less likely to be influenced by peers or any outside source. Variables of Interest Attributes of the variables are important in this research. The male juveniles chosen will be between the ages of 12 to 17. The ethnicity or race of the juveniles are not important to this research, because it is not quantitative. It might be important for a research that is looking to know how many juveniles from certain race commit delinquent acts, but in this research, the goal is to find out if the consumption of any controlled substance or illegal drug alter juvenile delinquency rates. A controlled substance is any substance or medication that people use to get high. An illegal drug, is any substance that cannot be used under a certain age, or that cannot be used at all in the United States. These definitions bring us to the meaning of juvenile delinquency, which is any deviant behavior or delinquent act that juveniles commit during the course of adolescence or at a certain age that is between twelve and seventeen. This definition relates to the questions in the survey that ask about the juvenile committing any delinquent acts or deviant behaviors. The independent variable in this research is the drug or illegal substance that the juvenile consumes before the commission of a delinquent act. The dependent variable is the delinquent act itself depending on the consumption of illegal drugs or controlled substances. It is the dependent variable because as we hypothesized, if the juvenile does not take drugs or if he does not use controlled substances then the delinquency rate will probably go down. The control variable is the situations that happen to the juvenile when he is outside of school. Problems at home, child abuse, child neglect, being a victim of bullying, parents that abuse illegal substances, parents or family members that abuse alcohol in front of the juvenile amongst other, are examples of what could be considered the control variab.

1. Term Paper Assignment
CRIJ 3300 Applied Research and Methods
9 Pages
Introduction
In the American Criminal Justice System, many young adults
commit delinquency acts. In this paper, the goal of this research
is to find out if the use of any controlled substance or any
illegal drug incite male juveniles in high school delinquency. I
hypothesize that if male juveniles that attend high school
consume any controlled substances or illegal drug, then their
crime commission or delinquency rates will increase. If male
juveniles that attend high school commit crime or delinquency
acts, and they do not consume controlled substances or illegal
drugs, their crime rates will go down or remain the same.
Population of Interest
For this research, the population of interest will be male
juveniles of American nationality who attend a public high
school in Chicago, Illinois.
Unit of Analysis
The unit of analysis proposed to analyze for this research will
be individuals. Individual students who get studied in a research
can be less likely to be influenced by peers or any outside
source.
Variables of Interest
Attributes of the variables are important in this research. The
male juveniles chosen will be between the ages of 12 to 17. The
ethnicity or race of the juveniles are not important to this

2. research, because it is not quantitative. It might be important
for a research that is looking to know how many juveniles from
certain race commit delinquent acts, but in this research, the
goal is to find out if the consumption of any controlled
substance or illegal drug alter juvenile delinquency rates. A
controlled substance is any substance or medication that people
use to get high. An illegal drug, is any substance that cannot be
used under a certain age, or that cannot be used at all in the
United States. These definitions bring us to the meaning of
juvenile delinquency, which is any deviant behavior or
delinquent act that juveniles commit during the course of
adolescence or at a certain age that is between twelve and
seventeen. This definition relates to the questions in the survey
that ask about the juvenile committing any delinquent acts or
deviant behaviors. The independent variable in this research is
the drug or illegal substance that the juvenile consumes before
the commission of a delinquent act. The dependent variable is
the delinquent act itself depending on the consumption of illegal
drugs or controlled substances. It is the dependent variable
because as we hypothesized, if the juvenile does not take drugs
or if he does not use controlled substances then the delinquency
rate will probably go down. The control variable is the
situations that happen to the juvenile when he is outside of
school. Problems at home, child abuse, child neglect, being a
victim of bullying, parents that abuse illegal substances, parents
or family members that abuse alcohol in front of the juvenile
amongst other, are examples of what could be considered the
control variable. The control variables are included in this
research because it may affect the results of our study. It is a
very important part to consider because the outside sources that
may affect the juvenile’s life can be a reason for the juvenile to
commit delinquent acts.
Prior Research/Rationale and Background
Research has been made regarding juvenile delinquency and
substance abuse and many of the studies have found that child

3. neglect is a factor that leads juveniles to commit delinquent
acts. A study conducted on 2011 by Chenn and colleagues,
states that “Children who were neglected during at a young age
were found to have a significantly higher tendency to be
involved in risky health behaviors such as violence perpetration,
drug and alcohol abuse, and other behaviors during adolescence,
and many extend these behaviors well into their adulthood” (pp.
275). This study claims that children who are abused or
neglected tend to commit more delinquent acts.
But is it only child neglect that can lead to juvenile
delinquency? There are many things that can make juvenile
commit delinquent acts. Various studies done suggest that
delinquency is caused by social interactions or things that
happen to the juvenile and biological factors. One of those
factors can be alienation, which is “an emotional state brought
by environmental and/or economic conditions and has long been
used by social scientists to explain deviant behavior (Calabrese,
1990 Abstract). Accordingly, juvenile delinquency can be
provoked by alienation. These deviant behaviors are a cause of
social factors, and lead them to substance abuse, drug
consumption and avoidance of goal accomplishments. Since
these studies suggest reasons for juvenile drug abuse and
delinquency, our research will try to find out if drugs or
substance abuse themselves can be a reason for juveniles to
commit delinquent acts. This study is worth conducting because
many researchers have found various factors that can encourage
juvenile deviant behaviors, but the studies do not really explain
or mention that drugs are a factor for juvenile delinquency. In
the studies, doing drugs is seen as the delinquent act that
juveniles commit, not as the factor that causes them to commit
delinquent acts.
According to a study that was conducted in Spain, the
percentage of juveniles who use drugs according to DeSouza
and colleagues (2009), they have different drawbacks like

4. physical abandonment, emotional and vulnerable trajectories
convergent with exclusion.
“Las tasas de prevalencia tienden a ser mayores entre los
adolescentes que, según De Souza, Sewell y Ranganathan (2009,
413), soportan diferentes carencias (abandono físico, emocional,
trayectorias vulnerables convergentes con la exclusión).”
(DeSouza, Sewell, Rangathan 2009), quoted in (Xavier,
Navarro-Perez, & Cosin, 2016).
It might be the same for American juveniles or it might be
different, but many of the factors that lead to juvenile
delinquency are similar in many ways. The explanation of these
reasons come in different results of certain studies, but the
purpose of this research is to see if drugs alter the delinquency
rates in juveniles. Since using drugs and abusing controlled
substances is a deviant or delinquent behavior, research does
not focus on if it alters the delinquency rates when juveniles
consume drugs or controlled substances. Research only support
that drugs are a part of deviant behavior in teenagers, and that
“individual drug use shows a consistent relationship with many
criminal behaviors, including violent and property crime”
(Phillips, 2017, pp. 134).
Sampling Strategy
The sampling strategy proposed to use in this research is Simple
Random Sampling (SRS). In SRS, we sample a part of the
population of interest. This sample should help us to be able to
generalize. Also, “each member of the population has a known
probability(chance) of being selected” (Dickinson, 2018). Our
sample population is all male juveniles who are of American
nationality and attend a public high school in Chicago, Illinois.
The sample that we collected was chosen by randomization,
where each member has a chance of being picked without bias
or prejudice. The sample must be representative of the

5. population that we want to study, meaning that the “aggregate
characteristics of the sample should closely resemble the
characteristics of the aggregate population” (Dickinson, 2018).
Even though it may not result in a perfectly representative
sample, we will use the Equal Probability of Selection Method
to do it where everyone has an equal chance of being selected
for the study. Two of the benefits of random selection is that it
“serves as a bias check and it can help us estimate our accuracy
and population parameters” (Dickinson, 2018). The individuals
in this study were selected randomly by randomly picking
public high schools in Chicago. After randomly selecting the
high schools, we got our sample frame, which was a list of the
male juveniles that attended the high schools selected. Then, out
of the lists, we picked random male students who were
American citizens which were 1000. Those randomly selected
students will be the represent the population in our study. One
of the benefits of this sampling strategy is that it “enables
statistical probabilities” (Dickinson, 2018). But as it can be
beneficial it can also have disadvantages like “requiring a
complete list of the population to be sampled, large samples
make process tedious, and representativeness is not guaranteed”
(Dickinson, 2018).
Threats to Validity
Respectively, this research can have several threats to validity.
One of the internal validity threats that this study can have is
maturation. If we present a pre-test and posttest, many of the
juveniles will mature in the time that we handle the study. Time
goes by and their opinions and ways of seeing things might
change affecting the study in them changing their answers or
lying in the surveys just to look good to others. Another threat
that this research can face is instrumentation. If we change from
survey to interviews just because the information required for
this study cannot be provided through a survey, then it will
probably make the juveniles uncomfortable, parents will not

6. give consent to interview their children, or they may not want to
participate in the study any further. Also, many of the results
can change from answering a survey to answering questions in
person, which can give a different outcome to the research.
Not very likely but probable that can threaten the validity of
this research is testing. If we conduct surveys on these juveniles
several times after certain time, then they might feel like just
changing their answers, or like lying in the survey since they
have already filled one out. Maybe they will be lazy to fill out a
survey again and they will put down random answers, or they
will not even want to answer further questions.
Ethical and Practical Issues
Just like this research can have validity threats, it can also have
ethical and practical issues. One of the ethical issues that this
study can have is that it might be a little unethical to give out
information to strangers about their parents, or their own
delinquent/deviant acts. The adolescent can feel scared to
answer questions about their parents and might not answer the
questions. Making juveniles feel scared though a survey might
be a little unethical for the research to continue.
To fix or manage this issue, maybe we can only ask questions
about them in the survey, even though it is important to know a
little about their backgrounds, their personal lives at home and
their social lives, to avoid an ethical issue we could just narrow
down the survey to only ask questions about their personal
experiences and not about anyone else. Another ethical issue
that this study might face is the consent of the parents to be in
the research. For some parents it would be unethical for
someone to be asking their children about drugs, and crime or
delinquent acts. To manage this issue, a consent form is made
for the juvenile and one for the parent. If the parent does not
give permission for the child to be part of this study, we can
eliminate the juvenile and randomly select another student.

7. Another ethical issue is that the children are underage, and it
could affect in a certain way. Minors would be telling us about
their criminal history or delinquent acts and sometimes it is
necessary to report those issues. Eventually the juvenile would
feel uncomfortable confessing to a crime. To deal with this
issue, it is applied a confidentiality part in the consent form, as
well as it states that being a part of this research is completely
voluntary. As of practical issues, I do not think that there would
be any. Having enough staff to pass out the surveys at their
schools, get in touch with the school for permission to conduct
research and taking a little of their time for them to answer the
survey should not be a problem if the correct person gets
advised about the goal of this research.
Limitations
One of the shortcomings that this research may have, would
probably be the sample population we will give the survey to. If
there are 219,202 students in public high schools and 102,036
are males, surveying 1,000 students will be a little too small for
the sample. Lack of staff and sources to move around the city
can also be a shortcoming that can affect us because if the
research takes long and the surveys are given out at different
times, maybe the responses of the juveniles are different.
Another shortcoming that this research may have is the
generalizability issue. The population chosen in this study does
not represent all male juveniles in the United States. This
research would only be applicable to the male juveniles in
Chicago, and not to everyone around this area. This limits our
findings because they are not applicable to population as a
whole.
Reference List
Calabrese, R., & Adams, J. (1990). Alienation: A cause of
juvenile delinquency. Adolescence, 25(98), 435.
Chen, W., Propp, J., deLara, E., & Corvo, K. (2011). Child

8. Neglect and Its Association with Subsequent Juvenile Drug and
Alcohol Offense. Child & Adolescent Social Work Journal,
28(4), 273-290.
Phillips, M. (2017). A Factor Analytic Model of Drug-Related
Behavior in Adolescence and Its Impact on Arrests at Multiple
Stages of the Life Course. Journal of Quantitative Criminology,
33(1), 131-155.
Xavier Uceda-Maza, F., Navarro-Perez, J., & Vicente Perez-
Cosin, J. (2016). Adolescentes y drogas: si relación con
delincuencia. Revista de Estudios Sociales, (58), 63-75.
Research Survey for Juveniles
Instructions: Please answer the following questions honestly
and to the best of your knowledge. Remember you have the
right to refrain from answering any questions that make you feel
uncomfortable or that you do NOT want to answer.
1. What is your age?
________
2. Do you attend High School on a regular basis?
A) Yes
B) No
3. Do you like school?
A) Yes
B) No
4. What grade are you in?

9. A) 9th
B) 10th
C) 11th
D) 12th
5. Have you ever consumed any controlled substance or illegal
drug?
A) Yes, if you answered yes to this question, please answer
questions 4, 5, 6 and 7.
B) No, if you answered no to this question, please skip
questions 4, 5, 6 and 7.
6. How long ago did you consume any controlled substance or
illegal drug?
_____________________________________________________
___________________
7. What kind of controlled substance(s) or illegal drug(s) did
you
consume?_____________________________________________
___________________
8. How did you feel when you consumed the drug or illegal
substance? Circle one.
Very Bad
Bad
No Feelings
Good
Very Good

10. 9. How many doses of the controlled substance or illegal drug
did you consume?
_____________________________________________________
___________________
10. What crime do you think young people are more likely to be
involved in?
A) Theft (shoplifting or stealing other people’s property)
B) Disorderly conduct (swearing loudly in public, causing fights
in public, etc.)
C) Destruction of private or public property (breaking windows)
D) Vandalism
E) Drugs
F) Alcohol
G) Other (please specify)
___________________________________________________
11. Have you or anyone you know that has taken part in juvenile
delinquency? (i.e. vandalism, destruction of private/public
property, stealing, shoplifting, trespassing, etc.)
A) Yes, if you answered yes please answer questions 12 & 13.
B) No, if you answered no please skip questions 12 & 13.
12. Prior to the delinquent act, had you or the person you know
that committed a youth crime taken any illegal drug or
controlled substance?
A) Yes
B) No
13. What do you think leads young people to commit crimes?

11. Why?
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________
__________________________________________
14. Do your parents live together?
A) Yes
B) No
15. If your parents live together, does one of them or both of
them have substance abuse issues, or alcohol abuse issues?
A) Yes
B) No
16. If you answered yes to question #15 please provide the
substance(s) your parent(s) abuse.
_____________________________________________________
________________
17. Have you ever been a victim of another student or person
around the age of 12-17?
A) Yes
B) No
18. If so, what was it that the juvenile did to you?
_____________________________________________________
___________________
In this section, please read the statements and circle one of the

12. numbers to which you answer pertains. Circle one number only
to provide your response.
Strongly Disagree
Disagree
Neutral
Agree
Strongly Agree
19. I take notice of what goes on around me.
1
2
3
4
5
20. Youth crime is a huge problem in our community.
1
2
3
4
5
21. I have been a victim, or a witness of a youth crime.
1
2
3
4
5
22. I am not afraid to give my opinion if I feel strongly about
something.
1

13. 2
3
4
5
References
Sabo, M. (2017). Young People Survey. Retrieved from
https://www.kaggle.com/miroslavsabo/young-people-survey
No Author (n.d.) Questionnaire on Youth Crime. Retrieved from
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/PN6FMD7
1
CRIJ 3300 Applied Research Methods in Criminal JusticeDr.
DickinsonTerm project instructions
For this assignment, you will create several sections of a
research proposal. You must write a short paper that states 1)
your research question and hypothesis (if applicable); 2) the
population of interest; 3) the units of analysis; 4) the variables
of interest; 5) the background and rationale for your proposed
project—this section must include 4 outside references; 6) your
sampling strategy; 7) any potential threats to validity; 8) any
possible ethical and practical issues; 9) any limitations of the
proposed study; and 10) a reference page. The paper must also

14. include a short survey consisting of 20-30 survey questions.
Details about what I expect for each of these parts are listed
below. **Please note that you are not actually going to conduct
this project—it is just a proposal for a project. This assignment
is worth 100 points.
Important date:
· Final draft due 3/9/19 @ 11:59pm MST
· Submit paper on Blackboard (I recommend doing this early as
this will run the paper through SafeAssign—this way you can
check yourself for accidental plagiarism)
· I will deduct 5 points from your total score for each day you
are late submitting the paper on Blackboard up to a maximum of
35 points. If you are more than a week late submitting the paper
on Blackboard, you will receive a 0 on the assignment.
The paper:
The actual paper should be written in narrative form (i.e., full
sentences, full paragraphs). This paper should be from 5 – 9
pages long. This section of the term project is worth 70 points.
The paper should include each of the following sections. The
sections should all begin with a bold-faced, centered heading.
1. Research question: In this section you will tell me what your
research question is. That is, what are you proposing to study?
a. Remember, that this is a survey project. Hence, you must
create a research question that can be answered using a survey.
b. Remember that surveys are good at capturing opinions,
perceptions, etc.
c. Some research questions will have independent and
dependent variables (e.g., “Are UTEP students that were raised
by drug using parents more likely to smoke marijuana?”; “Are
former victims of crime more likely to own guns?”). Other
research questions are exploratory and will not have
independent and dependent variables (e.g., “How do UTEP
students feel about gun control?”; How should sex offenders be

15. treated after release from prison?”).
d. For questions with independent and dependent variables you
must state a hypothesis or hypotheses.
2. Population of interest: In this section you will tell me the
population that you are interested in finding something out
about? For instance, is it all Americans? Is it all Texans? All El
Paso residents? All college students? Etc.
a. Remember that the population is the group that you are trying
to find something out about. The sample is the group that you
are actually surveying.
3. Units of analysis: In this section you will tell me what units
of analysis will your proposed study examine? Individuals,
Groups, Social Organizations, or Social Artifacts?
4. Variables of interest: This section will likely be 1-3 pages
long. Here you will tell me:
a. What variables you will be collecting data on. If you have
independent and dependent variables, clearly identify them.
Also identify any control variables in your study—that is,
variables that may have some influence on your results.
Common control variables include demographic ones such as
age, race, gender, and social class.
b. The key part of this section is for you to provide conceptual
definitions of your variables. Do not assume that I know how
YOU conceptualize these variables. Provide a clear definition of
each variable so that I know exactly how you do and do not
define them.
c. You should also note which of the survey measures relate to
your variables.
d. Example: “In the present study I define drug use as the use of
an illicit drug such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin, or
methamphetamine, as well as the use of prescription drugs in a
manner not prescribed or the use of prescription drugs
prescribed to other individuals. Survey questions 7-15 are
measures of this variable.”
5. Prior research/Rationale and Background: For this section,
you must find four outside sources that cover either your

16. proposed topic/research question or something related to it. You
must then provide short reviews of this literature that are 1-2
paragraphs long.
a. The four sources must be academic/scholarly sources.
Websites, popular magazines, blogs, vlogs, newspapers, etc. do
not count. Articles from peer-reviewed journals and books are
appropriate.
b. The book assigned for the course does not count as an outside
source.
c. I recommend going to Google Scholar and typing in your
topic as the search terms. Most of the sources that come up are
acceptable for this assignment. If on campus, there will likely
be hyperlinks to the materials to the right of the respective
articles that will take to a webpage wherein you can download
them. If off campus you can go to this webpage
https://admin.utep.edu/Default.aspx?tabid=74367 and download
the UTEP VPN onto your computer. Then connect through the
VPN and you will be able to gain access to sources just as if
you were on campus.
6. Sampling strategy: In this section you will tell me what
sampling strategy you are going to use.
a. State what sampling strategy are you going to use.
b. Describe the sampling method.
c. Describe why it is appropriate to use.
7. Threats to validity: Discuss any potential threats to validity
that your study design may face.
a. State at least two threats to validity that may affect the
results of your proposed study.
b. Define these threats to validity.
8. Ethical issues: Discuss any ethical issues the proposed study
may face and how you are planning to eliminate and/or
minimize them.
a. Describe one or more ethical issues you may have to
consider.
b. Describe what measures you would include in the study to
counter these ethical issues.

17. 9. References
a. The references must be in APA format. Please make sure to
include all the references used in the study.
Survey:
You must also include a survey that includes questions that can
be used to collect data on the variables of interest and their
relationships with each other. This part of the term project is
worth 30 points. The survey should look as professional as
possible. To this end, please be careful to pay attention to the
spacing of questions, the ordering of questions, and the overall
design of the survey. Also make certain to pay attention to
whether your questions and answer categories are exclusive and
exhaustive and are worded properly (e.g., no double-barreled
questions). The survey must include: 1) Open and close-ended
questions; 2) at least one contingency or matrix question; and 3)
questions relating to all of your variables. The survey must
include at least 20-25 questions. It is permissible to take
questions from pre-existing surveys. If you choose to do this,
however, you must provide a reference to the source where you
located these examples on your reference page.
Citation and references:
When using pre-existing questions or referencing the ideas of
others that are not your own (as you will in the prior
research/rational and background section) please use APA
formatting. Refer to
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/
for APA guidelines. The reference section will be the very last
part of the paper section of this assignment. IMPORTANT:
Please only use APA formatting for your in-text and reference
page citations.

18. Writing:
This exercise will require that you write clearly and concisely.
If you require assistance in writing, I strongly urge you to seek
assistance from the writing center. You will be judged on
grammar and spelling as well as content so make sure that you
revise and edit your paper. Do not use contractions!!!Writing
suggestions for paper:
· Avoid first-and-second-person (I, me, my, we, our).
· Avoid slang and clichés (since the beginning of time, putting
the cart before the horse, better said than done, etc.).
· Do not use contractions in formal writing (can’t, wouldn’t,
don’t, etc.).
· Be consistent with verb tense. A common mistake is to
alternate between present and past tense.
· Make sure that you do not use plural verbs with singular nouns
or vice versa.
· Avoid over-generalizing statements such as “Most people
think” & “Everybody knows.”
· Answer the question that you are asked. Read the assignment
questions carefully.
Format:
The paper should meet the following formatting requirements.
Points will be deducted for failing to comply:
· Must be typed!
· 12-pt. black Times New Roman font
· Double-spaced
· 1-inch margins all around
· Page numbered in lower right corner
· Indent first line of each paragraph
· No extra lines between paragraphs
· Correct spelling, punctuation, and grammar
What you are going to turn in:

19. This is how I want you to organize the various parts of the term
project when turning it in.
1. Title page—please include the name of the assignment, your
name, my name, the course number and name, the semester, and
overall page length of all sections combined. Please see below
for an example title page.
2. The paper
3. The survey
Example title page:
Term project assignment
Your name here
Dr. Dickinson
CRIJ 3300 Applied Research Methods in Criminal Justice
Spring 2019
insert # here pages

20. 1