Method is the tool or instrument one uses to measure crime (or
height, or weight). The method one might use to measure weight is to step on the bathroom
scale. There are obviously other methods for measuring weight.
There are many methods for measuring crime.
One method might be to go to the police department and go
through all of their files.
Another method might be to use the data provided by the Centre
for Justice Statistics,
and yet another method might be to design a questionnaire to be
given to people asking if they have ever committed a crime or been a victim of a crime.
Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating
phenomena and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous
knowledge.
The essential elements of a scientific method are iterations,
recursions, interleavings, and orderings of the following:
Characterizations - Quantifications, observations, and
measurements.
Hypotheses - theoretical, hypothetical explanations of
observations and measurements
Predictions - reasoning including logical deduction from
hypothesis and theory.
Experiments - tests of all of the above.
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