# Firearm Related Studies Vol 2: Investigating the Link Between Gun Possession and Gun Assault **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 8, 2018, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245 "2018-03-08T17:10:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/41 "2018-03-13T03:07:42Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > See, instead of actually adressing the points, you just hand wave and ridicule. In other words- \*\*you got nuthin. > > \*\* Well you got something alight, but the last quoted author was from 2004, demanding that the authors of 2009 had look at him; perhaps, but that is not obligatory. The 2009 researchers also put a lot of caveats in their research implying, as good researchers should, that indeed more research was needed. And of course this is ongoing. What it has to be mentioned is that if it was as flawed as the critics report then you know what should had taken place; and considering the resources the gun lobby if the research was as flawed: there is a precedent in cases of mistakes and flawed research papers published by climate change deniers. Papers that have been criticised so effectively that it leads to either the removal of the paper by the science journal or the editors quitting or being fired for incompetence. What it should be noticed here is that I have to say that IMHO the lack of a concerted effort to do this (demand removal of flawed papers or retractions or have editors inconvenienced) shows to me that many of the people that do check on the research do not see the flaws as the gun proponents wants them. And of course if the criticism had carried a lot of water it would had told other researchers to shy away from using the paper. But it what many of the critics ignore is that even if one can say that a paper has flaws, there is information to be used, as seen in a more recent paper: In the paper the researchers approach this from a mathematical angle, they concluded that: > [@](#): > > The model suggests that the rate of firearm-induced homicides can be minimized either by a ban of private firearm possession, or by the legal availability of guns for everyone, depending on the parameter values. While there is strong indication that the model assumptions and hence the properties are consistent with data, it will be important to collect more data to back up the underlying assumptions more strongly. (2) We illustrated how model parameterization can be useful in deciding the correct strategy to minimize the rate of gun-induced homicide by attempting parameter estimations, based on data that are available in the literature. These data have not been collected with this purpose in mind and are certainly not extensive enough to allow conclusive parameter estimates. With this constrain in mind, the preliminary parameterization of the model suggests that the firearm-induced homicide rate might be minimized by a ban of private firearm possession, and possibly reduced if gun availability is restricted to a certain extent. Due to the preliminary nature of the data used for model parameterization, however, this should not be viewed as a policy recommendation, which will require detailed epidemiological studies that collect extensive data sets specifically geared towards parameterizing the model. While the metrics they used make a better case for controlling guns (or even banning them, but I do not see that in my lifetime) more research is needed to see if it could go the other way, but the main reason why I looked at subsequent research was to see how other researchers see that 2009 paper that so ruffles the OP: > [@](#): > > carrying a gun increased the chance to die in the attack about 5-fold. The authors provided several reasons for this. Possession of a gun might induce overconfidence in the victim’s ability to fight off the attacker, resulting in a gun fight rather than a retreat. In addition, the element of surprise involved in an attack immediately puts the victim in a disadvantageous position, limiting their ability to gain the upper hand. If the victim produces a gun in this process rather than retreat, this could escalate the attacker’s assault. These data would indicate that _B2/B1\>1_ , which in turn would mean that a ban of private firearm possession is the only possible strategy that can minimize the gun-related death of people (the probability _h_ is by definition less than one). The results of this study have, however, been criticized on statistical grounds and it is currently unclear whether _B2/B1\>1_ is indeed greater than one [36], [37]. Results are also likely to depend on the geographical location. This study was conducted in a metropolitan area, and results might differ in smaller cities or more rural areas. However, the general notion that gun ownership does not lead to significant protection is also underlined by other studies that discussed the effectiveness of using guns as a defense against attacks [38]–[41], especially in a home setting, although parameter estimates cannot be derived from these studies. In a literature review, no evidence was found that gun ownership in a home significantly reduces the chances of injury or death during an intrusion [41]. On the other hand, this is a very difficult parameter to estimate statistically, because potential shootings that prevent deaths are less likely to be reported to authorities than shootings that do results in death. **A precise estimation of this parameter will be a crucial part of future research.** ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/42 "2018-03-13T04:04:58Z")
And I had to miss the link to the last quoted paper: Dependence of the Firearm-Related Homicide Rate on Gun Availability: A Mathematical Analysis Dominik Wodarz1,2,\* and Natalia L. Komarova1,2 Derek Abbott, Editor > **[Dependence of the Firearm-Related Homicide Rate on Gun Availability: A...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3724776/)** > > In the USA, the relationship between the legal availability of guns and the firearm-related homicide rate has been debated. It has been argued that unrestricted gun availability promotes the occurrence of firearm-induced homicides. It has also been... ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/43 "2018-03-13T04:21:00Z")
I dislike all studies that compare the increase, reduction, or possession of firearms with “firearm related” offenses. So what!? I like to see studies that compare those things with all violent crime or murders, etc. When a study shows that owning a gun in the home make people X% more likely to have a gun accident, I cringe. You needed a study for that? Or that an increase in guns results in more _gun_ violence. But does it result in less _overall_ violence?? I don’t know, but that’s what I’d like to see in a study. Gun bans result in a decrease of gun-related homicides? Really? That’s great, but what correlation does it have with all homicides? Maybe there is a decrease in homicides as a whole, due to the protections afforded by guns, but as a consequence, the gun-related murders are up. I think these kinds of studies are much more valuable than all the ones comparing gun bans to gun crimes. Compare them to the rates of all violent crimes. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/44 "2018-03-13T04:33:54Z")
If only there was an organization out there that might be able to fund such research. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/45 "2018-03-13T04:44:01Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > I dislike all studies that compare the increase, reduction, or possession of firearms with “firearm related” offenses. So what!? I like to see studies that compare those things with all violent crime or murders, etc. When a study shows that owning a gun in the home make people X% more likely to have a gun accident, I cringe. You needed a study for that? Uh, you lost me right there. To see why check this thread: > **[Many Scientific studies are Bullshit we already know](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=714575)** > > I have long wondered why a lot of so called scientific, peer reviewed studies are just plain bullshit about human behavior. The latest I just read from google news is that a new study reported that Russian men who drink lots of vodka die earlier than... It was about ‘how silly it was for scientists to investigate why and how many more Russians die younger for abusing vodka’. Why would someone waste money in a study for what it is obvious or known? As I noted, and most also reported to that OP: “Even with a little educated guessing I think that groups like insurance entities in Russia will be able to use that data to make better risk assessments and save money. The point is that regardless what one thinks that ‘some things are so obvious that they should not be investigated’, what happens is that studies are not done to benefit the preconceptions of armchair scientists; but are made also to help industry and government to quantify an issue so resources can be used better.” So it is for something seemingly silly as looking at how often gun accidents happen at home. It is not only governments or people worrying about guns, but insurance companies and even gun owners that should not be in the dark about what to do to lower risks in those situations. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/46 "2018-03-13T04:59:32Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I guess you didnt read his article: M_ethodologically, comparing gun assaults without shootings to those resulting in shootings could have addressed the issue of whether gun possession changed the risk of being shot in an assault, but no such comparison was attempted_ Just so you know I didn’t miss this: this is asking for a different study, not pointing to a sjmple reality test. ---
**Author:** ![galen\_ubal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/galen_ubal/32/4440_2.png) [@galen\_ubal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galen_ubal)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/47 "2018-03-13T05:10:47Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > I dislike all studies that compare the increase, reduction, or possession of firearms with “firearm related” offenses. So what!? I like to see studies that compare those things with all violent crime or murders, etc. When a study shows that owning a gun in the home make people X% more likely to have a gun accident, I cringe. You needed a study for that? Or that an increase in guns results in more _gun_ violence. But does it result in less _overall_ violence?? I don’t know, but that’s what I’d like to see in a study. Gun bans result in a decrease of gun-related homicides? Really? That’s great, but what correlation does it have with all homicides? Maybe there is a decrease in homicides as a whole, due to the protections afforded by guns, but as a consequence, the gun-related murders are up. I think these kinds of studies are much more valuable than all the ones comparing gun bans to gun crimes. Compare them to the rates of all violent crimes. [This page has a couple of illuminating charts.](https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/9/16618472/mental-illness-gun-homicide-mass-shootings) It shows that while the US is in the bottom half of overall crime rates, both violent and nonviolent, it has a hugely higher incidence of homicide. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/48 "2018-03-13T06:52:57Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > So it is for something seemingly silly as looking at how often gun accidents happen at home. It is not only governments or people worrying about guns, but insurance companies and even gun owners that should not be in the dark about what to do to lower risks in those situations. I get it. I’m not saying that there isn’t valuable information to be obtained from learning about accidents rates, etc. I’m referring to people with anti-gun agendas who quote results from studies such as, “People who own guns are X% more likely to commit suicide with a firearm.” “Countries with more guns have more gun crime.” Do they have more crime? Or just more gun crime. Would the gun owner have killed themselves by some other means if they didn’t own a firearm? Are the suicide rates higher among teens whose parents have guns in the home? Or is it just suicides-by-gun that are higher!? And I’m not saying these types of studies don’t exist. I know there are studies that address these things. My comment was merely to suggest that these studies, and not the ones I described, are the ones that should be used when discussing gun control. It’s disingenuous and irrelevant to talk about reduction in _gun_ crimes that will result in fewer guns. Yea, no shit. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 7:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/49 "2018-03-13T07:24:09Z")
> [@galen\_ubal](#): > > [This page has a couple of illuminating charts.](https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/9/16618472/mental-illness-gun-homicide-mass-shootings) It shows that while the US is in the bottom half of overall crime rates, both violent and nonviolent, it has a hugely higher incidence of homicide. Right. And those are the kinds of statistics that are relevant to gun-control debates. Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to make a pro OR anti gun statement here. I’m just making a comment about particular type of study and/or statistic thrown around during gun-control debates. In fact, there is a decent example among your _illuminating charts_. [This chart](https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/EdWFo13O2lIHBtxtPwsrdRprPyw=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/9632497/swanson_slide2.png) for example, makes the illuminating claim that assaults in the US are more likely to involve guns than countries without so many guns. That’s exactly the type of pointless, obvious statistics that I’m talking about. I’m not saying that, taken as a whole, the paper doesn’t make a decent argument for greater control, etc. I’m just saying that it is grating to here people throw out, all by itself, that kind of statistic and act like it somehow shows that guns are a problem. Having more assaults involve firearms says nothing about the overall rates of assault in general. Maybe the rate of total assaults is drastically lower in the US. Gun control discussions should, in my opinion, focus on overall crime not just gun-related crime. This is because one of the specific theories of pro-gun advocates is that having a gun makes someone safer and prevents crime. In their mind they will think that more guns on the streets and more people carrying guns will result in fewer people getting robbed or raped, etc. “Sure, more assaults involve guns in America,” but you haven’t disproven the idea that, “an armed population reduces the rates of assaults among that population.” In fact, your cite even mentions the lower rates of total assaults in the US, but explains it away as differences in reporting, etc. So an armed population of 100,000 people, might have 3x as many gun-related assaults. But it might also have half as many assaults as other countries. Given armed country A and unarmed country B, both with 100,000 people. A has 100 assaults, and 30 gun-related assaults. Country B has 300 assaults, but only 10 gun-related assaults. With those numbers, Country A has 3x the number of gun-related assaults, but also 1/3 as many assaults overall. So which country has safer citizens? Anyway, I think I’ve put way to much explanation into this. And people are going to think I’m trying to make some kind of pro-gun argument here. But I’m not. I’m just trying to point out that studies showing, “… that while the US is in the bottom half of overall crime rates, both violent and nonviolent, it has a hugely higher incidence of homicide” are so much more relevant and important in gun control debates than, “the US has X% more gun-related whatevers than these other countries”. If, instead, **galen ubal** ’s quote from a study was that “…it has a hugely higher incidence of _gun-related_ homicides”, it would have been the type of cringe worthy statistic I’m talking about. Instead, it actually references all homicides, and is therefore a useful, meaningful piece of information. ---
**Author:** ![galen\_ubal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/galen_ubal/32/4440_2.png) [@galen\_ubal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galen_ubal)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/50 "2018-03-13T07:35:44Z")
[Various statistics on gun violence in the US.](http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/) ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/51 "2018-03-13T13:32:58Z")
First - while interesting I’d like to leave more generalized information out of this thread, as well as other various studies. There are lots of different threads to discuss the general issues, but this one is about a specific study. > [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > You keep writing about this as if the investigators, once they have the data in hand, have to bring in additional information to then do the analysis. They don’t. > > Once the data is collected, it is wrong to say “they would then need to find out how much location explains the difference in their results.” The data would tell them in their data how much variation in caseness the indoor/outdoor variable explained. They don’t have to extrapolate. I’m not questioning that the authors performed mathematical calculations to come to their results. The ideal state would be to match the controls to the case examples exactly save for the variables trying to be studied. The more the control examples vary from the case, the more adjustments needed to control for those. Smallish differences are better than largish ones. But if the differences in population are very large, then larger adjustments are necessary to align them - to control for them. How large an adjustment is needed when the case examples varied by location (indoor/outdoor) by 900%? So yes, the authors probably made adjustments for this, but the larger the adjustment, the less accurate the predictive value the results would yield. And this is just on the location criteria which I’ve focused on thus far. There’s plenty more shortcomings in this study. > [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > Thus, the key in regards to evaluating this study and its limitations is whether it is telling us something consistent with other studies. And the answer is that it is. > > Further, this pointilistic approach - taking each single study and clutching and grasping for limitations in order to claim the entire study null and void - is not scientific. Nor does it suggest that one is open to all possibilities in engaging in debate on the subject. Consistency in result is good. Of course, if a series of studies consistently used methodology that was poor, the result would be consistently poor - that doesn’t make the results accurate. So yes, this thread focuses on a single study because it focuses debate. General directionless discussion of firearms is available across the boards if that’s your fancy. > [@Gray\_Ghost](#): > > **Bone** , is this the study from Philly that didn’t bother to exclude felons from its gun possession or victims of gun violence pools, then went and made sweeping associations between gun possession and being a victim of gun violence? If so, it was hilarious the last time it was cited here. > > Because non-felons who carry a gun are exactly the same as felons who carry, and totally have the same risks for being a victim of violence. Yes - the case population had a much higher rate of criminal background. Another significant weakness. It’s as if being engaged in criminal enterprise wouldn’t be a characteristic to influence violent encounters. > [@CarnalK](#): > > Criminology has nothing to do with anything. I think it can be relevant. The authors starting point for case examples were those that were shot after being assaulted - victims of a crime. Guns aren’t exactly like a disease that can be treated the same way other diseases are. There may be overlap in analytical methods, but I wouldn’t go so far as to exclude an entire discipline. > [@GIGObuster](#): > > … there is a precedent in cases of mistakes and flawed research papers published by climate change deniers. Not everything is about climate science. That’s all the time I have for now. I’ll get back with more on some of the other weaknesses in the study outside of the location aspect. ---
**Author:** ![Tee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@Tee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tee)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/52 "2018-03-13T14:39:41Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > "In fact, none of the evidence presented by the authors actually has any relevance to the issue of the effectiveness of defensive gun use, for the simple reason that at no point do they ever compare crime victims who used guns defensively with victims who did not. Instead, they made only the essentially irrelevant comparison between people who were shot in assaults with the rest of the population, noting whether gun possession was more common among the former than among the latter. Not surprisingly, after controlling for a handful of (badly chosen) control variables, they found that gun possession is more common among gunshot victims. > > This pattern, however, says nothing about the effectiveness of defensive gun use, but rather is merely a reflection of the fact that the same factors that place people at greater risk of becoming assault victims also motivate many people to acquire, and in some cases carry away from home, guns for self-protection. In sum, this is what researchers refer to as a “spurious” association – a non-causal statistical pattern due to the influence of some third factor(s) on the purported cause (gun possession) and the effect (gunshot victimization). For example, being a drug dealer or member of a street gang puts one at much higher risk of being shot, but also makes it far more likely one will acquire a gun for protection…\* To my knowledge I haven’t seen this study before this thread. I viewed it noting some key data at the beginning, that 3,202 individuals were assaulted with guns over a period of three years, in Philadelphia, and their select group of 677 is overwhelmingly black, male, and outdoors at night in places with high drug trafficking. The percentage given for gun possession is lower than I would have guessed, and the percentage of people shot reported as “professional” is higher than I would have guessed, and kids were excluded from the study, which suggested to me that the problem goes beyond gangs battling each other and into the general public. The general public still has to live in and traverse and do business in high-crime areas, and who there _isn’t_ interested in self-protection? The conclusions boil down to guns not being great defensive tools in places where guns and violence abound. By all means shed some light on this if you think it’s warranted, credentials or no credentials, just be sure that your point doesn’t depend on all of these people being crack dealers, because they weren’t. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/53 "2018-03-13T15:00:28Z")
> [@Tee](#): > > just be sure that your point doesn’t depend on all of these people being crack dealers, because they weren’t. Does “professional” mean “customer”? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/54 "2018-03-13T15:02:56Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > Not everything is about climate science. And not everything on my post was about it, just to notice that you are falling for sources that are using the same tactics as the climate change deniers regarding what to do about science papers. > [@Bone](#): > > That’s all the time I have for now. I’ll get back with more on some of the other weaknesses in the study outside of the location aspect. Like for example, nitpicking as if that had been my whole post. The argument continues to be about the weaknesses (that good researches do note and did), as if weakness is then just the only thing what we should consider. But that is not IMHO science. As it turns out other researchers do still see it as science. Just not going down to the level of dismissing it because other researchers also reported that other studies show that this one is not happening a vacuum, there were other studies that show it can not be completely dismissed as the gun proponents want it too. Even after all the critics try to make themselves so important (they can be, but their opinion only goes so far) one should be aware how important their opinion is taken by the ones that count: > **[Charles Branas Takes Aim at Gun Violence](https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/news/charles-branas-takes-aim-gun-violence)** > > Charles Branas, the incoming chair of the Mailman School’s Department of Epidemiology beginning January 1, has spent a career upending conventional wisdom on questions like who is at risk of gun violence (short answer: everyone, including gun... > [@](#): > > The incoming chair of Epidemiology has overcome intimidation and funding droughts to contribute scientific discoveries that shine a light on practical, apolitical solutions to gun violence > > Charles Branas, the incoming chair of the Mailman School’s Department of Epidemiology beginning January 1, has spent a career upending conventional wisdom on questions like who is at risk of gun violence (short answer: everyone, including gun owners). Along the way, he has been cited by the Supreme Court and attacked by the gun lobby, while making a forceful case that firearm violence is a major concern for public health. > [@](#): > > In the Crosshairs > > A year later, Branas published a study examining a primary function of firearms—protection during an attack. He found that people who carried guns were more than four times more likely to be shot than those who were unarmed, perhaps because people with guns were more likely to overreact or become entangled in dangerous situations. A later meta-analysis graded this study “best in class” among a series of related studies over recent decades. > > The gun lobby responded forcefully, lambasting Branas’ research and putting him on the cover of their magazine, distributed to 5 million members and Congress. Branas received threatening emails and calls, and industry groups pressured the University of Pennsylvania to remove him. They further argued that the NIH-funded research was part of a larger Obama Administration plot against gun owners when, in fact, the research had been funded under the Bush Administration. > > Under intense pressure, Congress passed a rider blocking National Institutes of Health funding for firearm violence research in 2011. Branas remained undeterred, but the funding cuts and intimidation took a toll, with a marked decline in the number of published papers on gun violence nationally. After the tragedy in Newtown, the Obama Administration was able to make a strong push to lift gun violence research funding strictures. Since then, the NIH has called for new grant proposals focused on firearm violence research and the number of major grants funded for gun violence research has increased. So, yeah you are wrong here about your dig that I was just going about climate science, I was not talking about climate change, but about how papers in science are dealt with when they are indeed grossly wrong, It has happened before with anti-vaccine papers from Anthony Wakefield. The general point from critics has been that the paper is grossly wrong, but the point remains that if that was so then the same fate of Anthony Wakefield or Willie Soon would had befallen to Branas and many others. It would be silly then to also just reply to me that “not everything is about vaccine science”. Hence the point here that you are doing that only to avoid dealing with one very important context: The critics are not making much headway in the scientific community. Like with other issues where science is not always agreeing with conservative politicians, right wing media or social media, their case then is made forcefully outside academia. It is not only a complaint here, but a warning to consumers of right wing media. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/55 "2018-03-13T15:13:12Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > Somebody help **DrDeth** with humor and popular cultural refences. > > But I’ve spent too much time (again) in this thread explaining specific issues and answering questions with detail to have someone tell me I’ve got nothing. See ya. Yep, you got nuthin. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/56 "2018-03-13T15:15:51Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > Criminology has nothing to do with anything. Yeah, murder, crime, shootings, they have nothing to do with Criminology. :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/57 "2018-03-13T15:33:40Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > The ideal state would be to match the controls to the case examples exactly save for the variables trying to be studied. Again, case-control studies are one type of design, but not the only one. They certainly aren’t some kind of gold standard - they provide strengths and weaknesses. > [@](#): > > The more the control examples vary from the case, the more adjustments needed to control for those. Smallish differences are better than largish ones. But if the differences in population are very large, then larger adjustments are necessary to align them - to control for them. How large an adjustment is needed when the case examples varied by location (indoor/outdoor) by 900%? So yes, the authors probably made adjustments for this, but the larger the adjustment, the less accurate the predictive value the results would yield. You’re writing as if the adjustment made in a regression is proportional to the number of cases in particular categories. This is false. Let me try to explain it to you. Imagine that you have a study with 100 men and 100 women, and you find out that being a man relative to being a woman explains 1% of the variance in cancer outcome. You’re writing about this issue as if a study that had 200 men and 100 women would find that being a man now explains 2% of the variance, or that a study with 400 men and 100 women would find that being a man explains 4% of the variance in cancer outcome. The amount to be adjusted in explaining cancer outcomes associated with gender is going to remain around 1% in each model. You’re suggesting that I have to adjust 4 times as hard in the latter model than the former, but that is nonsensical. It’s a bit like suggesting that if I have a poll of 100 men and 100 women that says 51% of men favor Trump, a sample of 200 men and 100 women would find that 102% of men favor Trump. It just doesn’t work that way. As long as you have sufficient numbers within a cell to get a decent representative estimate of the relationship for that cell, adding more people does not proportionally increase that estimate of the relationship. The variability within a predictor is a factor, and is taken into account in the regression modeling. > [@Bone](#): > > And this is just on the location criteria which I’ve focused on thus far. There’s plenty more shortcomings in this study. Sure, but what you’ve written thus far about location is not a functional criticism of the study. It’s coming from a place of ignorance about how regression modeling works. Move on if you like, but you’ve not explained how location is a failing of this study. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/58 "2018-03-13T15:36:54Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > In the paper the researchers approach this from a mathematical angle, they concluded that: > > While the metrics they used make a better case for controlling guns (or even banning them, but I do not see that in my lifetime) more research is needed to see if it could go the other way, but the main reason why I looked at subsequent research was to see how other researchers see that 2009 paper that so ruffles the OP: Oddly that is pretty much contrdicted by my other cited papaer: [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2004.tb00539.x/abstract](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2004.tb00539.x/abstract) ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/59 "2018-03-13T15:46:06Z")
= > [@DrDeth](#): > > Yep, you got nuthin. I agree with Hentor here but for context reasons, namely how seriously the critics in academia are considered, (kept in mind but not given too much sway) or how seriously word salads from the critics of the study that are not involved in related research are. (not seriously at all). On edit, that was nice, but the reaserchers of 2013 point to other reserch that supported the maligned 2009 one. ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2018, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firearm-related-studies-vol-2-investigating-the-link-between-gun-possession-and-gun-assault/810245/60 "2018-03-13T16:22:27Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > And not everything on my post was about it, just to notice that you are falling for sources that are using the same tactics as the climate change deniers regarding what to do about science papers. > Like for example, nitpicking as if that had been my whole post. I’m didn’t say it was your whole post. The rest I didn’t have comment on, so I didn’t. Like the rest of this post - there’s nothing of substance that is germane to the study at hand. > [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > You’re writing as if the adjustment made in a regression is proportional to the number of cases in particular categories. This is false. > > Let me try to explain it to you. Imagine that you have a study with 100 men and 100 women, and you find out that being a man relative to being a woman explains 1% of the variance in cancer outcome. You’re writing about this issue as if a study that had 200 men and 100 women would find that being a man now explains 2% of the variance, or that a study with 400 men and 100 women would find that being a man explains 4% of the variance in cancer outcome. The amount to be adjusted in explaining cancer outcomes associated with gender is going to remain around 1% in each model. > > You’re suggesting that I have to adjust 4 times as hard in the latter model than the former, but that is nonsensical. It’s a bit like suggesting that if I have a poll of 100 men and 100 women that says 51% of men favor Trump, a sample of 200 men and 100 women would find that 102% of men favor Trump. > > It just doesn’t work that way. As long as you have sufficient numbers within a cell to get a decent representative estimate of the relationship for that cell, adding more people does not proportionally increase that estimate of the relationship. The variability within a predictor is a factor, and is taken into account in the regression modeling. Then you’ve misinterpreted the criticism. It’s not a simplistic addition criticism as you describe. Notice how you say as long as you have sufficient numbers within a cell? Do you think they did that perfectly? By your reasoning, in this study that used a little under 700 case example where 83% of them were outdoors, and just 9% of the controls were outdoors, you think the association they found would be unchanged if instead those percentages were swapped? And the method of conditional logistic regression would yield the same results? I’m not doubting the math that was used. But somehow having wildly different case vs control populations is just fine because that variation can simply be controlled for with regression. I’m saying it is not very convincing given the low levels of change necessary to render the results nonsignificant. Maybe I’m not communicating clearly given how far off your interpretation above is. Here is the same basic [critique from link (about midway down the page)](http://austringer.net/wp/index.php/2009/10/05/gun-possession-and-assault-with-a-firearm-risky-stuff-or-not/) from DrDeth: > [@](#): > > There is no simple relation between the relative numbers and the resultant risk factors that are reported. Since case-control studies are supposed to work by highlighting how a treatment group differs from a control group, it is problematic to see just how the small, non-significant differences between these groups in the particular character of interest get expanded into the fairly large risk factors given in the paper. The raw, unadjusted numbers don’t paint gun possession as being generically risky; in fact, across all cases, it shows a slight association with less relative risk. So it is only through the opaque method of adjustment of confounding factors that the startling relative risk estimates for gun possession come about. That process has a lot to do with how the models mentioned are constructed, and that information is not available via the published paper. > > If we assume that all “adjustments” are made to the control data, we can estimate just how much “adjustment” had to occur in order to arrive at the published relative risk numbers for the “gun possession” condition in the three different contexts. I’ll lay this out in a set of tables, too. > [table not included in quote] > These tables show that the models used for “adjustment” of the raw data, if applied to the “control” raw data, would have reduced each raw control value for “gun possession” to about one-fifth its original value. This seems pretty aggressive for a model only described in general terms. This information reinforces the point that the startling and headline-grabbing statements about “gun possession” being risky are not founded upon the raw data, but instead come from the model. In order to put trust in the findings, the model needs far more transparency than this paper delivers. * * * Moving on from location, the thing that drew me to this study was this part of the conclusion: > [@](#): > > On average, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot in an assault. This isn’t well supported by both the data as well as the study methodology. The study doesn’t attempt to assess the protective value of gun use or possession at all - all of the case examples were taken from those who were first assaulted, then shot. It does not include any who avoided getting assaulted or those who avoided getting shot for any reason, including defensive gun use. How the study can conclude on the efficacy of defensive gun use without actually measuring that is a fatal flaw. The idea of reverse causation is mentioned in the study, and is consistent with the results. Those that suspect they may be attacked may be more likely to carry weapons - those involved in illegal activity, etc. And when we look at the breakdown of the case vs controls, they were more involved with illicit drugs, in areas where there were higher illicit drug trafficking arrests, and higher history of prior arrests. The controls were also taken from the city as a whole, not accounting for different areas of a large city have different levels of crime, etc. Nor did the study take into account any firearm training, length of ownership, etc. It treated a person as possessing a firearm for the control group _“if they reported any guns in a holster they were wearing, in a pocket or waistband, in a nearby vehicle, or in another place, quickly available and ready to fire at the time of their matched case’s shooting.”_ But of course, for many gun owners if some rando calls them on the phone and asks them about their guns, they aren’t going to be forthcoming. All of these are weaknesses in the conclusion drawn from this study. 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