Armed Citizen Analysis

What I am afraid of here is we have taken 482 incidents that we can all learn from and we stick them in a blender can come out with numbers. I think there are too many problems behind the numbers to make them useful at all. the fact that there is no source is also troubling.
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This is not hard to do for those that want to start learning about it on their own. We all regularly have access to info about gunfights and robberies and assaults and so on. It is easy (particularly with a computer) to start listing the factors that you can know about from the info provided. Start looking for trends....number of shots fired (gives info like average of shots, need to reload, etc.) BG reactions (continued assault, left scene, DRT, etc.) and so on. Before you know it you have your own database.
 
There are studies that include failed attempts at defense, and the findings tend to be much the same.
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That may be true, If the numbers are the same or close it validates this analysis, all I am saying is the method of accumulating these numbers from Armed Citizen is very unscientific

Start looking for trends....number of shots fired (gives info like average of shots, need to reload, etc.) BG reactions (continued assault, left scene, DRT, etc.) and so on. Before you know it you have your own database.
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Again, not very scientific.
 
The big Question answered

The big Question answered!

So! Show me one incident that does not valadate... Glock 19, sixteen rounds of 127g +P+ 9mm, and a spare magazine with 17 rounds of the same, and bright flash light on the same belt as the rest of the afore mentioned kit!T

Plus great night sights!!

And a Happy New Year to all!
 
I am getting way to academic here, but from this book
images

A population is
The collection of all outcomes, responses, measurements, or counts that are of interest
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Obviously nobody has such information as not all gun uses are even recorded. The next best thing is to take a sample which is
A subset of the population
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The book goes on to say
Sample data can be used to form conclusions about populations. Sample data must be collected using an appropriate method, such as random selection. If it is not collected using an appropriate method, the data are of no value
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The Italics are the authors and not mine. This is chapter one page 5. It is harder to use stronger language than "of no value"
 
study?

Well now.

I remember a "study" quoted to us in my first ccw class. It showed the percentage of "stopped" incedents with one or two rounds by caliber. It was more involved than this, but I remember 9mm "stopped" the attack 62% of the time with two or fewer shots, while .45acp "stopped" the attack about 98% of the time. More calibers were listed, and my numbers might be a little off (poor memory), but that was the gist of it.

This was followed by the viewing of a fox news clip where a man in Israel used what appeared to be a .38 snub to defend himself from an attacker. The man fired all 5 shots with no response from the attacker. He did not even know he had been shot, and the attack continued.

Now this is a most excellent argument for the use and carry of .45acp. Indeed, the instructor was heavily advocating the .45acp as the "only" use-worthy caliber. But... This is as much emotional staging as is used by the "Brady bunch" in their anti-gun bs

What I take from this is that a "study" can be formed to bring in whatever results and support whatever position the person conducting the "study" wants to support. In like turn, how many of us are so bold as to quote "studies" that don't support our position during one of these arguments? How many times in your life have eggs been bad for you, and then good again? Careful not to date yourself.

The two things that we can all get out of this, as with the original articals? One is a bit of reassuring entertainment. And two, the knowledge that God even loves a fool that would thwart a lion with a .32.

Lol
 
That may be true, If the numbers are the same or close it validates this analysis, all I am saying is the method of accumulating these numbers from Armed Citizen is very unscientific.
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No disagreement from me there. But one can often identify trends and issues without getting into rigorous scientific studies, particularly when many different sources provide very similar results.
Again, not very scientific.
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Agreed, but probably far more scientific than just making a wild guess about any of the stuff. And depending on how you choose to use the information and what you are looking at it can certainly rise to the quasi-experimental level.

The Italics are the authors and not mine. This is chapter one page 5. It is harder to use stronger language than "of no value"
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But note that the author does not say that a random sample is the only way to collect data, only that the data must be collected using an appropriate method, with a random sample being one example of an appropriate method.
 
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Well, I did the study because when I looked for something definitive on the subject to give my students all I found was a bunch of anecdotes or conjecture and speculation. The anecdotes usually took the form of: "I had friend on the force who knew an officer in another town, who heard about such and such an incident." The conjecture was mostly pulled out of the person's fourth point of contact based on reading gun magazines or the ErrorNet.

My Analysis has some gaping holes in it but I still haven't found anything better or even as good. Please don't point me to SOP-9 or LEOKA; as a professional researcher, the holes in both and/or faulty analysis that they engender is too much for me to bear. :barf:

The difference in situational dynamics between private citizen incidents and LE incidents is too large to be ignored. Absolutely apples and oranges. If anyone has done a valid study of the nature, not quantity, of private citizen incidents, I would love to hear about it.

BTW, it was a woman who shot the lion.
 
Well, I did the study because when I looked for something definitive on the subject to give my students all I found was a bunch of anecdotes or conjecture and speculation.
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Then many thanks and kudos, to you, Claude. It is a great example of how one can take information readily available in the public sector and use it to identify trends and patterns without getting into lots of esoteric research design and analysis issues.
 
Kathy, I first published it on an Internet Forum (frankly I don't remember which) because I was so fed up with the mis/disinformation I saw over the years. I wrote it a couple of years before I wrote my article for CCM.
 
What The Armed Citizen does not and cannot chronicle is how many assaults are not attempted because the would-be assailant is deterred by the possibility that the would-be victim is armed.
 
No disagreement from me there. But one can often identify trends and issues without getting into rigorous scientific studies, particularly when many different sources provide very similar results.
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Ah, one can often misidentify trends or rather identify trends that don't actually exists or miss trends that do without getting into rigorous scientific studies. Mis-sampling (or rather the sampling of non-representative data) in such analyses is a real issue in coming up with properly identified trends.

What The Armed Citizen does not and cannot chronicle is how many assaults are not attempted because the would-be assailant is deterred by the possibility that the would-be victim is armed.
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Nor does it document the number that occurred in spite of the possibility that the victim is armed.

Nor does it chronicle how many were stopped without a gun or how many were NOT stopped with a gun.

In reality, it doesn't chronicle a whole lot of the known incident population and certainly none of the unknown population.
 
Ah, one can often misidentify trends or rather identify trends that don't actually exists or miss trends that do without getting into rigorous scientific studies. Mis-sampling (or rather the sampling of non-representative data) in such analyses is a real issue in coming up with properly identified trends.
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True, but when you find multiple studies, done by multiple parties, that all indicate the same trends it is fairly telling. And certainly far better than the oft-heard "I think I might sometime maybe need just in case..." nonsense that passes for reasoning with so many on so many gun forums

.
 
Claude Werner said:
The difference in situational dynamics between private citizen incidents and LE incidents is too large to be ignored. Absolutely apples and oranges.
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This is a good retort to the antis who say: "Civilians carrying concealed weapons doesn't do any good because even trained policemen only hit their targets 20% of the time!".
 
The big Question answered!

So! Show me one incident that does not valadate... Glock 19, sixteen rounds of 127g +P+ 9mm, and a spare magazine with 17 rounds of the same, and bright flash light on the same belt as the rest of the afore mentioned kit!T

Plus great night sights!!
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Exactly.

Just because a lowest common denominator is statistically sufficient, that doesn't mean that simply meeting that lowest statistical common denominator is the most optimal choice one can make.

So sure, someone can argue that 3 shots of .25 caliber may be statistically sufficient in most self defense situations, but that doesn't mean that being armed with 3 shots of .25 caliber is an optimal self defense choice.

So I'll stick to my USPc or G17 70-80% of the time (and my 638 the rest of the time).
 
"This is a good retort to the antis who say: 'Civilians carrying concealed weapons doesn't do any good because even trained policemen only hit their targets 20% of the time!'."

The trainer I know with the largest number of private citizen CCW students who have been in shootouts (49 incidents at last count) has a student hit ratio of 95%. Probably because he trains them correctly and personally can demonstrate how to shoot well.
 
Claude,

I am sure good training makes a difference. However, the bigger difference maker is the fact that LEOs have to enforce the law and arrest BGs. We civilians don't and so the dynamic as you stated earlier is totally different and actually is in our favor. For one, I believe when most BGs attack civilians they probably don't expect them to be armed and when they take on a cop they KNOW he/she is armed and so respond accordingly. Maybe with more CCWs that may have an impact on BG thinking?
 
handgun effectiveness

The goal in self defence is to make the assailent change his behavior. Just showing a gun has been effective for me. My mother used to run horses and cattle out of the yard with ratshot. It is not uncommon in the country for people to use 22's on large troublesome animals. It works on people too. They quit messing arround. Any anamal or person shot with a 22 is hurt probably badly hurt. When doped up people take multiple large rounds it is more of a testament of the power of the drugs than the lack of power of the gun.
 
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