DOI: 10.3886/icpsr04552.v1
title: National Firearms Survey, 1999
title: Version 1

description: This survey was undertaken to obtain information on the
 characteristics of gun ownership, gun storage and gun carrying
 practices, and weapons-related incidents in the United
 States--specifically, use of guns and other weapons in self-defense
 against other people. Data were collected using national random-digit
 dial telephone surveys completed between March 19, 1999 and July 13,
 1999. Sampling was suspended after the school shooting in Littleton,
 Colorado on April 20, 1999, and resumed after a cool-down period.
 Part 1, Survey Data, contains the coded data obtained during the
 interviews, and Part 2, Open-Ended Verbatim Responses, consists of
 open-ended answers provided by the respondents. Four qualifying
 questions were asked, dealing with: (1) gun ownership, (2) gun display
 against the respondent, (3) gun use in self-defense against another
 person, and (4) the use of a weapon other than a gun in self-defense
 against another person. A "yes" response to a qualifying question led
 to a series of additional questions on the same topic as the
 qualifying question. Information was collected from all respondents on
 the perceived safety of their neighborhood, whether they would feel
 safer if more people owned guns, whether guns should be allowed in
 public places, whether gun injuries were a problem in their community,
 whether they would favor or oppose a program to reduce gun injuries,
 and whether they had ever been shot with a gun. Respondents living in
 households that currently contained a gun were asked how many and what
 type of guns were present, the main reasons for owning a gun, whether
 any of the guns were loaded and unlocked, and whether they had
 received formal firearms training. Questions about incidents in which
 a gun was displayed in a hostile manner against the respondent
 included the number of times it took place, how long ago it had
 occurred, whether the respondent was in the military or police force
 at the time, the location of the incident, whether the individual
 displaying the gun was known to the respondent, whether the respondent
 had a gun, and whether the police were contacted. Respondents who had
 used a gun or other weapon in self-defense in the last five years were
 asked about the number of times it took place, the location of the
 incident, whether they were in the military or police force at the
 time, the type of weapon used, whether they knew the other person,
 whether this individual also had a weapon, whether the police were
 contacted and arrests made, and what crime was committed. Additional
 questions asked respondents whether they smoked cigarettes, drank
 alcohol, whether they had gotten married, had had a fire in their
 home, and had been hospitalized for a fracture in the past year, and
 whether they had ever had contact with extraterrestrial life.
 Demographic variables include sex, age, race, education level,
 household income, type of residential area (e.g., urban, rural, etc.),
and age and number of children in the household.
description: Response Rates: Of the 10,774 telephone numbers that were randomly
 selected, calls to 2,588 yielded contact with households that were
 determined to be eligible (E) for the survey. Sixty-seven of these
 households (3 percent) declined to participate, yielding 2,521
 households that completed the survey (C). Two thousand seven hundred
 eighty-nine numbers were ineligible (I), because they were not working
 or were not residential, and the eligibility of 5,397 was not known
 (U) because there was no answer. Using a Council of the American
 Survey Research Organization formula [C/(E 1 (E/E 1 I)*U)], a response
 rate of 49 percent was calculated. This response rate is comparable to
 that of other national surveys on firearm ownership and falls within
 the response rates for most Behavioral Risk Factor Survey firearm
modules.
description: This survey is a random sample of United States
 households, selected by random-digit dialing, with sampling
 proportional to the total population of each of the 50 states based on
 1990 Census figures. It is nationally representative at the household,
not individual, level.
description: Datasets: 
DS0: Study-Level Files
DS1: Survey Data
DS2: Open-Ended Verbatim Responses
description: Persons aged 18 and over living in households with
telephones in the United States.
description: telephone interview(1) The data file in Part 2 was converted to Portable
 Document Format (PDF), and some information, such as exact place of
 employment and city names, was removed to ensure respondents'
 anonymity. No other changes were made to the file. (2) According to
 the principal investigator, comparisons of responses to the questions
 important to this study before and after the school shooting in
 Littleton, Colorado revealed no significant differences. (3) Per
 instructions from the principal investigator, a code of 2 was recoded
 into 5 in variable VE64, and a code 99 was recoded into 9 in variable
 VE101. (4) Values in variable VE65 are expressed in military time. (5)
The CASEID variable was created for use with online analysis.