This guide is designed to assist you with the signature assignment for CRCJ 2334 Introduction to Criminal Justice Systems. Please refer to your syllabus for specific instructions for the assignment. Use the navigation panel to the left to navigate to different topics. Students may also reach out to their subject librarian via e-mail or the appointment scheduler for a one-on-one research consultation. Appointments can be held in-person or virtually.
Statistics should be gathered and analyzed according to established methods that have been proven effective over time. This is call the methodology. A simple question you can ask yourself that will help you identify the strengths and weaknesses of any given methodology is WHY:
Questions to ask yourself when thinking about statistics:
The sites listed below include non-profits, media sites, and books written for a general audience- they are NOT scholarly sources. However, that does not automatically mean that the information provided is inaccurate or wrong.
Think of these sources like the movie version of a book- sometimes the movie holds very closely to the events and themes of the source material, and sometimes it seems like the director never read the book at all. You must use critical thinking and comparison with other sources to decide how accurate or well-supported their arguments are.
In addition to asking yourself the questions below, scan for keywords you encounter that can be used to research scholarly sources.
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