What You Missed This Week
A recap of The Art of Explaining Crime Season 2, Episode 7
This is The Art of Explaining Crime, an independent newsletter that helps you think and write about crime.
Hello from the Canadian city of Guelph, which is built on land in the Between the Lakes Purchase, a treaty and territory of the Mississaguas of the Credit. I have the privilege of living and doing the work of this newsletter there.1
In case you missed any of this week’s posts, which I refer to collectively as “Episode 7”, I’ve collected links below.
The Art of Explaining Crime
What I Do
The popular What I Do series used to be weekly, but will now appear on Wednesdays when I have someone to feature. Can you think of someone in the crime content space who you’d like me to feature? They could be a journalist, academic, advocate, author, or anyone else who routinely participates in creating content about crime. Let me know in a comment or direct message.
Five Studies About
This week’s free Five Studies About tip sheets included:
How researchers in Boston developed a tool to define and evaluate “harm reduction housing” (FSA: Harm Reduction)
Neither the boys nor the girls in a new study see image-based sexual harassment and abuse as a crime
Crime Research Updates
This week’s paid Crime Research Update tip sheets included the following posts. Remember that each post’s headline highlights a carefully selected study, the link to which appears before the paywall. Remember also that each will unlock three weeks after publication.
How VR can complement traditional therapy for juvenile offenders
Does high verbal intelligence help prevent future juvenile delinquency?
How A University Sexual Assault Prevention Program Helps Students Seek Help
The Explaining Crime season so far
Back to today’s post. Did you miss any earlier episodes? I’ve got you covered:
Thank you for reading The Art of Explaining Crime!
The Practice of Understanding Crime
For the first time in months, I wrote some crime science news. It’s short:
Some of what I’m reading
On Substack:
has a great piece on the differences between sociopaths and psychopaths, based on research and her experience as a clinician: is reading and reviewing the six books nominated for the “Fact Crime” category of the Edgar Awards. This week Tracy reviewed A Devil Went Down to Georgia:
In addition to these pieces, I’ve read a lot of great stuff recently, including from
and . Want me to share more of it in posts like this one? Let me know in the comments.Explaining Crime Tip: How to ask a researcher for their restricted access journal article
If you’ve clicked through to many of the studies I share, you’ll have come across studies that you can’t read in their entirety. You can usually read the study’s “Abstract” (summary). These are “restricted access” studies, and to view them through their publisher, you’ll need an account with an institution, like a university library, that has access rights arranged with the publisher. Or you can pay the publisher directly.
Other articles are available to read for free, in their entirety. These are “open access” articles.
Some publishers make you figure out whether a study is restricted or open access. Others are pretty clear. Sage, for example, marks restricted articles with closed grey lock icons, like this:
Sage marks open articles with open orange lock icons:
However, you’re not necessarily stuck if the research article you need is restricted. The researchers are usually allowed to share a copy of their study with people. You only have to ask.
From the study’s page on the publisher’s site (the page you should land on from the links I share), click on the name of the first author listed at the top of the study. This will usually open additional information about the author, including their institutional email address. Use this email to contact them directly. Tell them that you’re working on a project, that you think their study will be helpful, and ask if they could send you a copy. Thank them in advance for their time.
I’m working on text to acknowledge the history of this land, which has a long, rich history that I hesitate to sum up in a few sentences. This is a work in progress. As I do that work, I’m also reflecting on what I can do to contribute to reconciliation in my country, particularly Call to Action #86 (PDF). I do this as a white, cisgender, heterosexual man who has benefited immeasurably from the historical and current state of affairs. While I consider this work important for all of us to do, I think it’s particularly relevant to a newsletter about crime. I’ll come back to why I think that in future newsletters.
Aaron, Thank you so much for recommending my work. And for sending folks over to my page. I appreciate your work.
Kate
Many thanks for the promotion. We are experimenting with highlighting 3-5 articles per month that we think are interesting, different, and worthwhile. We will also be featuring some interviews with content creators investigating crime-related issues.
I would appreciate reading more about others you read; sometimes, the algorithm does not connect me sufficiently well with others in the crime-writing community.