U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

National Institute of Justice

Guns in America: National Survey on

Private Ownership and Use of Firearms

by Philip J. Cook and Jens Ludwig

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

National Institute of Justice

Jeremy Travis, Director May 1997

continued...

• Methods of, and reasons for, firearms

acquisition.

• Storage and carrying of guns.

• Defensive use of firearms against criminal attackers.

Gun ownership

Prevalence. According to conventional

wisdom, about half of American households own guns, a belief affirmed by a

long series of national polls dating back

to 1959.1

 Yet data from the 1994 telephone survey (National Survey of Private

Ownership of Firearms—NSPOF) indicate that just 35 percent (plus or minus

1.3 percent) of households own guns.

This estimate may be somewhat off the

mark but not by much. Conventional wisdom appears out of date.

The best available survey series on gun

ownership is the General Social Survey

(GSS), conducted by the National Opinion Research Center. Its estimates have

been lower than some others, in the range

of 40 to 43 percent during the 1990s. In

particular, the GSS estimate for 1994 was

just 41 percent. Another telephone survey in 1994 produced a still lower estimate for gun ownership, 38 percent of

households.2

The United States is unique among

wealthy nations in its vast private inventory of firearms. The nearly 200 million

guns in private hands are used in part for

recreation, mostly hunting and target

shooting. But what engenders the most

public controversy over firearms is their

use against people during either the commission of or defense against crime.

Gun advocates regard firearms as an important crime deterrent and source of

protection, while control advocates denounce guns for the damage they do in

the hands of criminals. What both groups

can agree on is that widespread ownership of firearms has an important impact

on the quality of life in America.

To learn more about the role of firearms,

the National Institute of Justice (NIJ)

sponsored—through a grant to the Police

Foundation—a nationally representative

telephone survey in 1994 on private ownership and use of firearms by American

adults (see "Firearms Survey Methodology"). This Research in Brief reports

some of the survey's more important findings, including the following:

• Size, composition, and ownership of the

Nation's private gun inventory.

Issues and Findings

Discussed in this Brief: Results of

a nationally representative telephone survey (1994) on private

ownership and use of firearms by

American adults. The survey provides the most complete data available on the private stock of

firearms in the United States.

Key issues: With nearly 200 million guns in private hands, firearms

have an important impact on the

quality of life in America. What is

the size and composition of the

Nation's private gun inventory?

What are the methods of, and reasons for, acquiring firearms? How

are firearms stored? How frequently are guns used against

criminal attackers?

Key findings: The survey data and

analysis yielded the following results:

• In 1994, 44 million Americans

owned 192 million firearms, 65

million of which were handguns.

Although there were enough guns

to have provided every U.S. adult

with one, only 25 percent of adults

actually owned firearms; 74 percent of gun owners possessed two

or more.

• The proportion of American

households that keep firearms appears to be declining.

• Sixty-eight percent of handgun

owners also possessed at least one

rifle or shotgun.

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

OFF ICE OF JUSTICE PROGRAMS

BJA NI J OJJDP BJS OVC
2

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

uted across the population, as is evident

from exhibit 2. Most striking is the gender gap: 42 percent of men but just 9 percent of women owned guns at the time of

NSPOF. (The gap is even wider when the

focus is on whether the respondent ever

owned a gun.) With respect to race,

whites were substantially more likely to

own guns than blacks (27 versus 16 percent), and blacks more likely than Hispanics (16 versus 11 percent). But for

handguns alone, the ownership rates

among blacks and whites were nearly

equal (13.1 versus 16.5 percent).

Gun ownership (and handgun ownership)

was highest among middle-aged,5

 collegeeducated people of rural and small-town

America. But one of the best predictors of

gun ownership was the presence of firearms in the respondent's childhood home.

People whose parents possessed guns

were three times as likely as others to

own one themselves. In fact, 80 percent

of all current gun owners reported that

their parents kept a firearm in the home.

Motivations. The most common motivation for owning firearms was recreation.

As shown in exhibit 3, about 35 percent

of gun owners (15 million people, 8 percent of the adult public) hunted in 1994,

and about an equal percentage engaged

Concentration. Despite enough guns in

private hands to provide every adult in

America with one, only one-quarter of

adults actually own firearms. Those who

have one gun usually have several: 74

percent possessed two or more in 1994.

Gun ownership is quite concentrated but

not more so than for other durable goods.

In marketing circles, the "80/20 rule"

suggests that the top fifth of all consumers of a product typically account for

four-fifths of all purchases by value.

NSPOF data indicate that the top 20 percent of firearm owners possessed 55 percent of privately owned firearms.3

 Of gun

owners in 1994, 10 million individuals

owned 105 million guns, while the remaining 87 million guns were dispersed

among 34 million other owners.

Persons owning several guns tended to

have varied collections, including rifles,

shotguns, and handguns.4

 We find that 68

percent of handgun owners also owned at

least one rifle or shotgun, suggesting

some experience and interest in the

sporting uses of guns. Exhibit 1 provides

additional data on the composition of private gun collections.

Demographic patterns. In 1994 gun

ownership was far from uniformly distrib-

• Gun ownership was highest

among middle-aged, collegeeducated people of rural smalltown America. Whites were

substantially more likely to own

guns than blacks, and blacks more

likely than Hispanics.

• The most common motivation

for owning firearms was recreation. Forty-six percent possessed a

gun primarily for protection against

crime.

• There were 13.7 million firearm

transactions in 1993–1994, including 6.5 million handguns. About

60 percent of gun acquisitions involved federally licensed dealers.

• About 211,000 handguns and

382,000 long guns were stolen in

noncommercial thefts in 1994.

• Slightly more than half of all privately owned firearms were stored

unlocked; 16 percent of firearms

were stored unlocked and loaded.

• In 1994, about 14 million adults

(approximately one-third of gun

owners) at least once carried a firearm in their vehicles or on their

person for protection.

• Evidence suggests that this survey and others like it overestimate

the frequency with which firearms

were used by private citizens to defend against criminal attack.

Target audience: Criminal justice

and public health researchers and

practitioners. Legislators and policymakers at all levels of government.

Issues and Findings

continued...

Exhibit 1. Composition of Gun Ownership (1994) a

a. There were 44 million gun owners in 1994.

Own 1

13%

Own 1

12%

Own 2+

23%

Own Both

44%

Own 2+

8%

Own Long 

Guns Only 

36%

Own 

Handguns 

Only 

20%
3

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

moral," or otherwise objectionable.

The remaining one-third were at least

open to the possibility of obtaining

firearms and might do so if their financial condition or motivation became

stronger. For many, the needed motiin sport shooting other than hunting.

Given the substantial overlap between

the two groups, about half (23 million)

of the Nation's 44 million gun owners

participated in a gun sport during

1994. Of those who owned only handguns in 1994, 40 percent used them

recreationally, almost entirely for sport

shooting other than hunting.

Another reason cited for firearm ownership was self-protection. Overall, 46

percent of gun owners possessed firearms (usually handguns) primarily for

protection against crime (41 percent

for males; 67 percent for females). Almost three-quarters of those who

owned only handguns kept them primarily for self-protection. Of course,

some people seek the protection of a

gun because they may be disproportionately likely to lead risky lives or

associate with violent people.6

 Those

who had been arrested for nontraffic

offenses were more likely to own firearms (37 percent compared to 25 percent in the general population).

But most persons do not own guns, and

the NSPOF included several items to

find out why. In 1994, about two-thirds

of gunless adults were actively opposed

to having guns in their homes because

they viewed guns as dangerous, "imExhibit 2. Gun Ownership Patterns (NSPOF Estimates, 1994)

Exhibit 3. Recreational Use of Firearms—Percentage of Gun Owners Who

Hunt, Do Other Sport Shooting, Do Neither

Note: The average number of days hunters said they spent hunting in 1994 was 16.4 days.

The average number of days sport shooters said they spent sport shooting in 1994 was

18.6 days.

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45

No

Yes

More Than High School

High School Diploma

Less Than High School

Hispanic

Black

White

65+

40–64

25–39

18–24

Female

Male

Total 16

7

8 8 16

11 9 20

13 3 16

7 4 11

7 4 11

10 8 18

15 9 24

19 10 29

23 13 36

17 10 27

16 7 23

21 11 32

2 9

26 16 42

9 25

Age

Education

Race

Sex

Parents Had Gun in Home?

Percentage of Respondents Owning Guns

Percentage Owning

Handguns (Whether or

Not Owning Long Guns As Well)

Percentage

Owning Long 

Guns Only Total Percentage

of Gun Owners

xx xx xx

Both Hunting

and Other Sport

Shooting

Hunting

Only 

18%

Sport

Shooting Only

(Other Than

Hunting)

Neither

48%

17%

17%
4

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

Firearms Survey Methodology

he NIJ-sponsored National Survey

of Private Ownership of Firearms (NSPOF)

was conducted by Chilton Research Services of Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania, during

November and December 1994. Data collected by the survey were analyzed by the

authors of this Research in Brief.

The telephone survey employed a listassisted random-digit-dial sampling

method, in which every residential telephone number had the same likelihood of

being selected. Each household selected

in this fashion was scheduled for as many

calls as needed (up to a maximum of six)

to make contact with the appropriate person and complete the interview. When a

household was first contacted, the interviewer asked to speak with the adult in

the household who had the most recent

birthday. Because this method randomizes the selection of respondents from

among the adults living in the household,

the NSPOF was a probability sample of

adults in the United States.*

Minimums were established for the number of completed interviews with racial

minorities and gun-owning households.

Such households were more likely than

others to be included in the final sample.

Sampling weights were calculated to adjust for this design feature and for other

sociodemographic differences between

the sample and the U.S. adult population.

Although these adjustments improved

the quality of population estimates based

on the NSPOF, some types of estimates

may still be biased. As in every survey,

some sample members refused to cooperate and others were never home when

the interviewer called. The concern is that

these nonrespondents may tend to differ

from the general population (and the

completed sample) in relevant ways. The

scope of that potential problem is usually

indicated by the response rate.

In the absence of a single accepted definition of "response rate," two reasonable

T

1994 National Survey of Private Ownership of Firearms (NSPOF)

Objectives: Provide national estimates for:

• Adult ownership of guns, by gun type.

• Sources and motivations for gun acquisition.

• Firearm safety and storage.

• Defensive use of firearms.

• Attitudes toward gun control.

Sample: Probability sample of 2,568 noninstitutionalized adults aged 18 and over who are fluent in English or Spanish and

live in households with a telephone.

Method: Telephone interview with one randomly selected adult from each household.

Population estimates: Weighted averages of relevant responses. Standard errors for estimates of population-prevalence

rates range up to 1.4 percentage points, somewhat higher for prevalence estimates within subpopulations.

definitions yield figures of 44 and 59 percent for the NSPOF. Thus, nonresponse

bias in our estimates is a real possibility.

Nonetheless, the response rate for this

survey is no lower than for other wellexecuted telephone surveys, and there

is no reason to believe that this survey used

a less representative sample than others.**

Most of the estimates contained in this

Research in Brief rely on the responses of

those who personally owned firearms.

The estimates do not rely on the reports

of those who did not personally own a

gun but lived in a gun-owning household because our analysis of the NSPOF

data suggests that the survey respond–

ents were often unwilling or unable to

report on guns owned by other adults in

the household. For example, we find

that in households headed by married

couples, women were much less likely to

report a gun in the house (which in most

cases would belong to their husbands)

than were men.

* For details about the GENESYS method employed by Chilton or other survey issues, see Brick, J.M., J. Waksberg, D. Kulp, and A. Starer, "Bias in ListAssisted Telephone Samples," Public Opinion Quarterly, 59:218–235. Also: Waksberg, J., "Sampling Methods for Random Digit Dialing," Journal of the

American Statistical Association, 73:40–46, 1978.

** Kleck, G., and M. Gertz, "Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense With a Gun," Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 86(1):150–187, Fall 1995. They reported a response rate of 61 percent for their national telephone survey of gun ownership and defensive gun use. In

calculating this response rate, they excluded all sample members whom they were unable to contact. By their definition, the NSPOF response rate would be

higher than 61 percent.
5

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

vation may have come from an increased concern about crime: nearly 5

percent of respondents reported that

they planned to obtain a gun for protection against crime within a year.

The stock of guns in private

hands

The NSPOF-based estimate for the total number of privately owned firearms

is 192 million: 65 million handguns,

70 million rifles, 49 million shotguns,

and 8 million other long guns (exhibit

4). Of the handguns, 48 percent were

revolvers, 40 percent semiautomatics,

and 12 percent were reported as "some

other type of handgun" by respondents.

The millions of guns in private hands included everything from cheap .22-caliber

"snubbies" to finely made high-powered

rifles worth thousands of dollars. The variety of firearm designs reflects the multiplicity of uses for which they are intended

and also influences the weapons' capacities for harm. Firearm regulations place

special restrictions on commerce in shortbarreled guns (because they are easily

concealed and disproportionately used in

crime) and on large-capacity magazines.

From our analysis, we find that the

magazine capacity of one-fifth of all

handguns was 10 or more rounds (exhibit 4B). The barrel of about one in

six handguns was 3 inches or shorter

(exhibit 4C).7

 Comparing handguns acquired in 1993 or 1994 with those acquired prior to 1993 permitted

examination of changes in the demand

for different kinds of handguns over

time. Handguns acquired more recently were more likely to have large

magazine capacities (37.8 versus 14.1

percent held 10 or more rounds) and

were less likely to be of small caliber,

defined as .32 or under (28.6 versus

38 percent). (See exhibit 4D.)

Transactions

Acquisitions. To date, little information has been available about gun

flows in the United States. The potential importance of this information is

its use in evaluating regulation of firearms commerce. For example, the Gun

Control Act of 1968 restricts interstate

shipments to federally licensed firearm

dealers (FFLs), who in turn are required to follow laws regulating retail

transfers. Transactions not involving

FFLs, known as the "secondary market," typically do not require

recordkeeping and are exempt from the

Federal requirement (for handguns) of a

waiting period and criminal record

check.8

 Moreover, secondary market

transactions are not subject to regulatory oversight. Thus, knowing the volume of informal transfers that do or do

not involve FFLs would be useful.

The average firearm in circulation in

1994 was acquired by its present

owner in 1981, with the average handgun having been acquired in 1983.

Persons owning handguns in 1994 acquired about 28 percent of them in

1993–1994, compared with 20 percent

of long guns. An estimated 13.7 million

transactions occurred during 1993–

1994, including 6.5 million involving

handguns. Sixty percent of long guns

and 68 percent of handguns were new

at the time of acquisition by their 1994

owners during the 1993–1994 period.

4A. Estimates of Number of Guns

Number in

millions

Handguns

Revolvers 31

Semiautomatics 26

Other 8

Total 65

Rifles

Semiautomatics 28

Other 42

Total 70

Shotguns 49

Other long guns 8

Total All Guns 192

4B. Magazine Capacity of Handgun

Stock a

Percentage

Number of of Handgun

Rounds Stock

1–9 rounds 79%

10 or more rounds 21%

a. The average number of rounds is 8.1.

How do people typically acquire firearms? As shown in exhibit 5, almost all

guns acquired during 1993 and 1994

were either purchased by the respondent

(73 percent) or received as a gift (19 percent). The remaining 8 percent were obtained through inheritance, a swap of

some kind, or other means.

4C. Length of Barrel

Percentage of Percentage of

All Handgun Handguns With

Stock Caliber .32 or Under b

1–3 inches 17% 37%c

4–5 inches 38% 31%c

6 or more inches 45% 38%c

b. The percentage of all handgun stock having a caliber .32 or under is 34 percent.

c. These percentages are not of all guns but only of those identified in the middle column.

Exhibit 4. Gun Stock Characteristics

(1994)
6

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

The predominant sources of guns,

unsurprisingly, were stores (60 percent). Other important sources included family members and

acquaintances. The 3 percent of respondents who indicated that they obtained guns "through the mail" (which

is illegal for all but FFLs) may have

misremembered or may have referred

to a mail-order purchase arranged

through an FFL.

The average gun obtained in 1993 and

1994 was worth $392 at the time of

transfer, with little difference between

handguns and long guns. Fewer than 1

in 20 guns acquired during those 2

years were valued at less than $100.

Fifty-seven percent of firearms were

obtained from stores, pawnshops, or

other sources that the respondents were

certain to have been federally licensed

firearm dealers. Some respondents

were not sure about whether the source

was an FFL. Others indicated that the

source was an FFL but then reported

that the transaction was a trade rather

than a cash sale or that the source was

an acquaintance or family member. If

those cases are included, the proportion increases to 64 percent.

We conclude that approximately 60

percent of gun acquisitions involved

an FFL and hence were subject to

4D. Magazine Capacity and Barrel Length by Time of Acquisition

Handguns Acquired Handguns Acquired

Prior to 1993 in 1993 or 1994

(N=234) (N=91)

Percentage of All Percentage of All

Magazine Capacity d Handguns Handguns

1–9 rounds 85.9% 62.2%

10 or more rounds 14.1% 37.8%

Percentage of Percentage With Percentage of Percentage With

Length of Barrel e Handgun Stock Caliber .32 or Under Handgun Stock Caliber .32 or Under

1–3 inches 17.6% 40.8% 17.4% 33.7%

4–5 inches 35.9% 30.5% 41.6% 31.1%

6 or more inches 46.5% 43.4% 41.0% 22.6%

d. The average number of rounds for guns acquired before 1993 is 7.6. For guns acquired in 1993 or 1994 it is 9.5.

e. The percentage of all handguns acquired prior to 1993 having a caliber .32 or under is 38 percent. The percentage of all handguns

acquired in 1993 or 1994 having a caliber .32 or under is 28.6 percent.

Exhibit 5. Methods and Sources for Gun Acquisition in 1993 and 1994 (NSPOF Estimates)

Percentage for Long Guns Percentage for Handguns Percentage for All Guns

(N=121) (N=128) (N=251)

What Best Describes How

You Obtained Your Gun?

Bought it 69 77 73

Received it as a gift 22 16 19

Traded something for it 3 2 3

Inherited it 5 4 5

From What Source Did You

Obtain This Gun?

Gun store 33 55 43

Pawnshop 5 8 6

Other store 18 3 11

Gun show or flea market 4 4 4

Through the mail 3 3 3

Member of the family 22 12 17

Friend or acquaintance 12 13 12

Other 5 3 4

Exhibit 4. Gun Stock Characteristics (1994) (continued)
7

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

Federal regulations on such matters as

out-of-State sales, criminal history

checks, and recordkeeping. A somewhat higher percentage of handgun acquisitions than long gun acquisitions

involved FFLs. The remaining acquisitions, amounting to about 2 million per

year, were off-the-books transfers in

the secondary market.

Thefts. A major theme highlighted in

a 1986 survey of incarcerated felons

was that theft was an important means

of obtaining firearms for those with

criminal intentions: 32 percent of surveyed felons had stolen their most recently acquired handgun.9

Based on the NSPOF, an estimated 0.9

percent of all gun-owning households

(269,000) experienced the theft of one

or more firearms during 1994. About

211,000 handguns and 382,000 long

guns were stolen in noncommercial

thefts that year, for a total of 593,000

stolen firearms. Those estimates are

subject to considerable sampling error

but are consistent with earlier estimates of about half a million guns stolen annually.10

Gun safety

Gun storage. Of 1,356 accidental

deaths by gunshot in 1994, 185 involved children 14 years old and

younger.11 For each such fatality, there

are several accidental shootings that

cause serious injury. Guns were also

the means of destruction in 19,590

suicides, 210 involving children 14 or

younger. For these reasons, safe handling and storage of firearms have attracted the attention of the public

health community.

We found that 20 percent of all gunowning households had an unlocked,

loaded gun in the home at the time of

the survey. This figure was substantially higher among handgun-owning

households than among households

with long guns only—30 percent versus 7 percent.

Slightly more than half of firearms of

either type were stored unlocked, but

handguns were much more likely to be

loaded. Reflecting their predominant

use in self-defense, handguns were

likely to be stored in bedrooms or vehicles of owners or even on their person, while most long guns were kept in

gun closets or other out-of-the-way

places (exhibit 6).

Although training programs usually include suggestions on how to store guns

safely, it does not appear that trainees

are paying attention. More than half

(56 percent) of owners had received

some form of "formal" training from

the military, law enforcement, National

Rifle Association, National Safety

Council, or other source. As a group,

owners who received such training

were no less likely than others to keep

guns loaded and unlocked. This surprising result is consistent with other

recent studies.12

However, a more detailed analysis of

NSPOF data that examined the effects

of different formal training programs

separately indicated one exception:

training programs such as those offered by local affiliates of the National

Safety Council were associated with a

significant reduction in the likelihood

of keeping a gun unlocked and loaded.

This result speaks well of that training,

the trainees, or both.

Carrying

Carrying a gun outside the home, especially in an urban area, is problematic because the public is at risk if the

carrier is reckless or inclined to violence. For that reason, carrying a firearm in a vehicle or on the person is

subject to a variety of State and local

regulations. In most States, carrying a

concealed gun is prohibited or restricted to those who have obtained a

special license. At the same time, many

States have reacted to public concerns

about crime by enacting laws under

which most citizens can usually obtain a

Exhibit 6. Storage Method and Location of Firearms (NSPOF Estimates)

Percentage for Long Guns Percentage for Handguns Percentage for All Guns

(N=437) (N=352) (N=789)

Storage Method/Location

Gun loaded 11 55 26

Gun loaded and unlocked 7 34 16

Where Gun Kept

Bedroom 17 37 24

Gun closet 53 26 44

Other closet 19 11 17

In vehicle or on person 1 16 6

Other 10 8 10
8

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

concealed-carry permit. Currently, 31

States have passed such laws.

About 14 million adults (approximately one-third of gun owners) carried firearms for protection at least

once during the 12 months preceding

NSPOF. Four million of them indicated

that they carried guns for protection "in

connection with work." Two-thirds who

carried guns kept them in their vehicles, while the others sometimes carried them on their person.

The occupations of respondents who report carrying guns in connection with

work are quite diverse. Somewhat surprisingly, only a quarter of this group

were employed in the protective service

field. The questionnaire does not distinguish between those who are required by their employers to carry

firearms as part of their occupational

duties and those who do so on their own

initiative. In any event, an estimated 3

million adults who were not in law enforcement or security carried firearms

for protection on the job in 1994.

The majority (56 percent) of those who

carried firearms outside of work did so

fewer than 30 days per year, but a substantial minority (22 percent) rarely

left home without a gun. On any given

day, 1.1 million people were carrying

guns on their person outside the workplace, while another 2.1 million stored

guns in their cars or trucks.

Some correlates of gun carrying are

worth noting. Males who carried guns

in 1994 were about 21

/2 times as likely

to have been arrested for a nontraffic

offense as other men (15 percent versus 6 percent). And a disproportionate

share of gun carriers resided in the

South, where the prevalence of carrying guns was almost double that of the

rest of the Nation.

Defensive gun uses

NSPOF estimates. Private citizens

sometimes use their guns to scare off

trespassers and fend off assaults. Such

defensive gun uses (DGUs) are sometimes invoked as a measure of the

public benefits of private gun ownership. On the basis of National Crime

Victimization Survey (NCVS) data, one

would conclude that defensive uses

are rare indeed, about 108,000 per

year. But other surveys yield far higher

estimates of the number of DGUs.

Most notable has been a much publicized estimate of 2.5 million DGUs,

based on data from a 1994 telephone

survey conducted by Florida State

University professors Gary Kleck and

Mark Gertz.13 The 2.5 million figure

has been picked up by the press and

now appears regularly in newspaper

articles, letters to the editor, editorials,

and even Congressional Research Service briefs for public policymakers.

The NSPOF survey is quite similar to

the Kleck and Gertz instrument and

provides a basis for replicating their

estimate. Each of the respondents in

the NSPOF was asked the question,

"Within the past 12 months, have you

yourself used a gun, even if it was not

fired, to protect yourself or someone

else, or for the protection of property at

home, work, or elsewhere?" Answers

in the affirmative were followed with

"How many different times did you use

a gun, even if it was not fired, to protect yourself or property in the past 12

months?" Negative answers to the first

DGU question were followed by "Have

you ever used a gun to defend yourself

or someone else?" (emphasis in original). Each respondent who answered

yes to either of these DGU questions

was asked a sequence of 30 additional

questions concerning the most recent

defensive gun use in which the respondent was involved, including the

respondent's actions with the gun, the

location and other circumstances of

the incident, and the respondent's relationship to the perpetrator.

Forty-five respondents reported a defensive gun use in 1994 against a person (exhibit 7). Given the sampling

weights, these respondents constitute

1.6 percent of the sample and represent 3.1 million adults. Almost half of

these respondents reported multiple

DGUs during 1994, which provides

the basis for estimating the 1994 DGU

incidence at 23 million. This surprising figure is caused in part by a few

respondents reporting large numbers

of defensive gun uses during the year;

for example, one woman reported 52!

Exhibit 7. Defensive Gun Use (DGU) Estimates for 1-Year Recall Period

(1994)—Comparison of NSPOF with Kleck and Gertz Estimates

NSPOF Estimates Kleck and Gertz

All DGUs DGUs Meeting

Against Kleck and Gertz

Persons Criteria*

1 Year (N=45) (N=19) (N=66)

Estimated number of

 defenders (in millions) 3.1 1.5 2.5

Estimated number of

 DGUs (In millions) 23.0 4.7 n/a

* In their 1995 DGU study, Kleck and Gertz presented estimates based on only the DGU

reports that met certain criteria (see text).
9

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

A somewhat more conservative NSPOF

estimate is shown in the column of exhibit 7 that reflects the application of

the criteria used by Kleck and Gertz to

identify "genuine" defensive gun uses.

Respondents were excluded on the basis of the most recent DGU description

for any of the following reasons: the respondent did not see a perpetrator; the

respondent could not state a specific

crime that was involved in the incident; or the respondent did not actually display the gun or mention it to

the perpetrator.

Applying those restrictions leaves 19

NSPOF respondents (0.8 percent of

the sample), representing 1.5 million

defensive users. This estimate is directly comparable to the well-known

estimate of Kleck and Gertz, shown in

the last column of exhibit 7. While the

NSPOF estimate is smaller, it is statistically plausible that the difference is

due to sampling error. Inclusion of

multiple DGUs reported by half of the

19 NSPOF respondents increases the

estimate to 4.7 million DGUs.

Some troubling comparisons. If

the DGU numbers are in the right

ballpark, millions of attempted assaults, thefts, and break-ins were

foiled by armed citizens during the 12-

month period. According to these results, guns are used far more often to

defend against crime than to perpetrate crime. (Firearms were used by

perpetrators in 1.07 million incidents

of violent crime in 1994, according to

NCVS data.)

Thus, it is of considerable interest and

importance to check the reasonableness of the NSPOF estimates before

embracing them. Because respondents

were asked to describe only their most

recent defensive gun use, our comparisons are conservative, as they assume

only one defensive gun use per defender. The results still suggest that

DGU estimates are far too high.

For example, in only a small fraction

of rape and robbery attempts do victims use guns in self-defense. It does

not make sense, then, that the NSPOF

estimate of the number of rapes in

which a woman defended herself with

a gun was more than the total number

of rapes estimated from NCVS (exhibit

8). For other crimes listed in exhibit 8,

the results are almost as absurd: the

NSPOF estimate of DGU robberies is

36 percent of all NCVS-estimated robberies, while the NSPOF estimate of

DGU assaults is 19 percent of all aggravated assaults. If those percentages

were close to accurate, crime would be

a risky business indeed!

NSPOF estimates also suggest that

130,000 criminals are wounded or

killed by civilian gun defenders. That

number also appears completely out of

line with other, more reliable statistics

on the number of gunshot cases.14

The evidence of bias in the DGU estimates is even stronger when one recalls that the DGU estimates are

calculated using only the most recently reported DGU incidents of

NSPOF respondents; as noted, about

half of the respondents who reported a

DGU indicated two or more in the preceding year. Although there are no details on the circumstances of those

additional DGUs, presumably they are

similar to the most recent case and

provide evidence for additional millions of violent crimes foiled and perpetrators shot.

Exhibit 8. Defensive Gun Uses Compared to Total Crime Counts (1994)

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

NCVS

(Crimes)

NSPOF

(DGUs)

NCVS

(Crimes)

NSPOF

(DGUs)

NCVS

(Crimes)

NSPOF

(DGUs)

1,299

466

2,478

462

322 316

Rape and

Attempts Robbery

(In Thousands)

Aggravated 

Assault
10

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

False positives. Regardless of which

estimates one believes, only a small fraction of adults have used guns defensively

in 1994. The only question is whether

that fraction is 1 in 1,800 (as one would

conclude from the NCVS) or 1 in 100

(as indicated by the NSPOF estimate

based on Kleck and Gertz's criteria).

Any estimate of the incidence of a rare

event based on screening the general

population is likely to have a positive

bias. The reason can best be explained

by use of an epidemiological framework.15 Screening tests are always subject to error, whether the "test" is a

medical examination for cancer or an

interview question for DGUs. The errors are either "false negatives" or

"false positives." If the latter tend to

outnumber the former, the population

prevalence will be exaggerated.

The reason this sort of bias can be expected in the case of rare events boils

down to a matter of arithmetic. Suppose the true prevalence is 1 in 1,000.

Then out of every 1,000 respondents,

only 1 can possibly supply a "false

negative," whereas any of the 999 may

provide a "false positive." If even 2 of

the 999 provide a false positive, the

result will be a positive bias—regardless of whether the one true positive

tells the truth.

Respondents might falsely provide a

positive response to the DGU question

for any of a number of reasons:

• They may want to impress the interviewer by their heroism and hence exaggerate a trivial event.

• They may be genuinely confused due

to substance abuse, mental illness, or

simply less-than-accurate memories.

• They may actually have used a gun

defensively within the last couple of

years but falsely report it as occurring

in the previous year—a phenomenon

known as "telescoping."

Of course, it is easy to imagine the

reasons why that rare respondent who

actually did use a gun defensively

within the time frame may have decided not to report it to the interviewer. But again, the arithmetic

dictates that the false positives will

likely predominate.

In line with the theory that many DGU

reports are exaggerated or falsified, we

note that in some of these reports, the

respondents' answers to the followup

items are not consistent with respondents' reported DGUs. For example, of

the 19 NSPOF respondents meeting

the more restrictive Kleck and Gertz

DGU criteria (exhibit 7), 6 indicated

that the circumstance of the DGU was

rape, robbery, or attack—but then responded "no" to a subsequent question: "Did the perpetrator threaten,

attack, or injure you?"

The key explanation for the difference

between the 108,000 NCVS estimate

for the annual number of DGUs and

the several million from the surveys

discussed earlier is that NCVS avoids

the false-positive problem by limiting

DGU questions to persons who first reported that they were crime victims.

Most NCVS respondents never have a

chance to answer the DGU question,

falsely or otherwise.

Unclear benefits and costs from

gun uses. Even if one were clever

enough to design a questionnaire that

would weed out error, a problem in interpreting the result would remain.

Should the number of DGUs serve as a

measure of the public benefit of private gun possession, even in principle? When it comes to DGUs, is

more better? That is doubtful, for two

kinds of reasons:

• First, people who draw their guns to

defend themselves against perceived

threats are not necessarily innocent

victims; they may have started fights

themselves or they may simply be mistaken about whether the other persons

really intended to harm them. Survey

interviewers must take the respondent's

word for what happened and why; a

competent police investigation of the

same incident would interview all parties before reaching a conclusion.

• Second and more generally, the

number of DGUs tells us little about

the most important effects on crime of

widespread gun ownership. When a

high percentage of homes, vehicles,

and even purses contain guns, that

presumably has an important effect on

the behavior of predatory criminals.

Some may be deterred or diverted to

other types of crime. Others may

change tactics, acquiring a gun themselves or in some other way seeking to

preempt gun use by the intended victim.16 Such consequences presumably

have an important effect on criminal

victimization rates but are in no way

reflected in the DGU count.

Conclusions

The NSPOF provides the most complete data available on the private

stock of firearms in the United States,

including the kinds of guns owned, by

whom they are owned, and for what

purpose they were acquired. When

asked, handgun owners usually gave

self-protection as their primary motive

for owning guns, while long-gun owners mentioned hunting or target shooting. Other findings support the

conclusion that handguns are much

more likely than long guns to be kept
11

R e s e a r c h i n B r i e f

unlocked and ready for use in the

home and to be carried in public; they

are much less likely to be used in

sporting activities. Despite those differences, demographic and socioeconomic patterns of firearm ownership in

1994 were similar for handguns and

long guns; in fact, most handgun owners also owned one or more long guns.

A fair conclusion is that the more fundamental divide is not between handgun and long-gun owners but between

those who own guns and those who do

not. Those who like guns, have some

experience with them, and have the

means to obtain them tend to keep several for various purposes. But most of

the adult public turns elsewhere for

recreation and protection against crime.

Over time, the relative importance of

self-protection and sport as motivations for gun acquisition and use has

changed. Perhaps as a result of the increasing urbanization of America, the

overall prevalence of gun ownership

appears to be declining, as is participation in hunting. Proportionately

fewer households owned firearms in

1994 than was true in the 1960s and

1970s, and the younger cohorts are entering into gun ownership at slower

rates than previous ones. When people

do acquire guns now, the motivation is

more likely self-defense than in the

past: The mix of new firearms sold in

1994 was equally divided between

handguns and long guns, whereas 25

years earlier twice as many long guns

were sold.17

The NSPOF does not provide much

evidence on whether consumers who

buy guns for protection against crime

get their money's worth. The NSPOFbased estimate of millions of DGUs

each year greatly exaggerates the true

number, as do other estimates based

on similar surveys. Much debated is

whether the widespread ownership of

firearms deters crime or makes it more

deadly—or perhaps both—but the

DGU estimates are not informative in

this regard.

For other purposes, the NSPOF is a reliable reference. Such information is

vital to the evaluation of the ongoing

debate over government regulation of

gun transactions, possession, and use.

Notes

1. For example, the December 1993

Gallup Poll estimated that 49 percent

of households possessed a gun.

2. Kleck, G., and M. Gertz, "Armed

Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence

and Nature of Self-Defense With a

Gun," Journal of Criminal Law and

Criminology, 86(1):150–187, Fall 1995.

3. For a discussion of the "80/20"

rule, see Clotfelter, C.T., and P.J.

Cook, Selling Hope: State Lotteries in

America, Cambridge, Massachusetts:

Harvard University Press, 1989. It is

possible that if one could adjust for the

value of guns, the degree of concentration would be still greater and better

fit the rule.

4. Fifty-five percent of all individuals

who owned four or more guns had at least

one in each of these three categories.

5. The NSPOF offers evidence that

gun ownership is declining. Not only

were middle-aged people more likely

to own a gun in 1994 than those under

age 40, but they were also more likely

to have acquired a gun by age 21.

6. Surveys of juvenile delinquents and

adult felons confirm the importance of

self-defense as a motive for gun possession by active criminals. For juvenile delinquents, see Sheley, J.F., and J.D.

Wright, Gun Acquisition and Possession

in Selected Juvenile Samples, Research

in Brief, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, December 1993. For adult felons,

see Wright, J.D., and P. Rossi, Armed

and Considered Dangerous, Hawthorne,

New York: Aldine, 1986.

7. Of some interest, given the controversy over the "Saturday Night Special," is that most short-barreled

handguns were not .22 caliber; twothirds were in excess of .32 caliber, the

same as for longer barreled handguns.

8. Cook, P.J., S. Molliconi, and T.B.

Cole, "Regulating Gun Markets,"

Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 86(1):59–92, Fall 1995.

9. Wright and Rossi, 1986, 183.

10. The standard error for this point

estimate is about four-tenths of a percentage point. Thus, the 95-percent

confidence interval ranges from

around 0.1 percent to 1.7 percent of

gun-owning households. Cook,

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Molliconi, and Cole, 1995, use data

from the National Crime Victimization

Survey for the period 1987–1992 to

estimate 511,000 stolen guns per

year.

11. Monthly Vital Statistics Report,

Department of Health and Human

Services, 45(3S), September 30, 1996.

Table 16.

12. Hemenway, D., S.J. Solnick, and

D. Azrael, "Firearm Training and Storage," Journal of the American Medical

Association, 273(1):46–50, 1995.

13. Kleck and Gertz, 1995.

14. In 1994 about 17,000 people were

shot dead in criminal assaults and

justifiable homicides. Given what we

know about the case fatality rate,

fewer than 100,000 nonfatal gunshot

woundings were known to the police.

(See Cook, P.J., "The Case of the

Missing Victims," Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 1985). Presumably,

the true number of justifiable shootings

was just a fraction of this total.

15. Hemenway, D., "Survey Research

and Self-defense Gun Use: An Explanation of Extreme Overestimates,"

Harvard Injury Control Center Discussion Paper, 1996.

Philip J. Cook, Ph.D., is ITT/

Sanford professor of public policy

studies, Duke University, and Jens

Ludwig, Ph.D., is assistant professor of public policy, Georgetown

University.

The national survey was supported

under grant number 93–IJ–CX–

0017, awarded to the Police Foundation by the National Institute of

Justice, Office of Justice Programs,

U.S. Department of Justice.

This Research in Brief is available

online at the Justice Information

Center home page (http://

www.ncjrs.org) and available

through fax-on-demand (800–851–

3420 or 301–251–5518; ask for

document number 1026). The fulllength report, as submitted to NIJ

by the authors and on which this

Research in Brief is based, may be

obtained through interlibrary loan

or, for a fee, as a photocopy from

the National Criminal Justice Reference Service (call 800–851–3420

for cost and other information).

The Police Foundation has published Guns in America: Results of

a Comprehensive National Survey

on Firearms Ownership and Use,

which is based on the full-length

report submitted to NIJ by the

authors. For ordering information,

call 202–833–1460 or write to the

Police Foundation, Attn: Publications,

1001 22nd Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20037.

Findings and conclusions of the research reported here are those of the authors and do not

necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice.

The National Institute of Justice is a component of the Office of Justice Programs,

which also includes the Bureau of Justice

Assistance, Bureau of Justice Statistics,

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Prevention, and the Office for Victims of

Crime.

NCJ 165476

16. Cook, P.J., "The Technology of

Personal Violence." In M. Tonry (ed.),

Crime and Justice: A Review of Research (Vol. 14), Chicago: University

of Chicago Press, 1–71, 1991.

17. Cook, P.J., "Notes on the Availability and Prevalence of Firearms,"

American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 9 Supp:33–38, May/June 1993.