DOI: 10.3886/icpsr38929.v2
title: The Cumulative Financial Costs of Victimization Among College Students at Minority Serving Institutions, 2021-2022
title: Version 2

description: The Challenges of Safety and Transitions Study (COSTs) was funded by the National Institutes of Justice (NIJ) to study the costs of victimization amongst a cohort of first-semester college students at minority-serving institutions (MSIs). COSTs consisted of three methodological components: 1) a three-wave prospective, longitudinal survey; 2) official campus enrollment and graduation data; and 3) focus group interviews. Advancing topical knowledge regarding the consequences and costs of victimization was achieved by querying participants about 12 unique types of victimization and a variety of tangible and intangible consequences and costs associated with specific victimization incidents up to one year after victimization. 
COSTs participants completed three semi-annual online surveys from the Fall 2021 semester through Fall 2022 (approximately three academic semesters). Incident-based victimization data were collected, and participants were queried about ongoing behavioral, emotional, and financial costs associated with reported victimization incidents for the duration of data collection. Survey data were supplemented in each academic semester by official enrollment and graduation data from the university in which the participant was enrolled at the start of COSTs in order to further assess academic outcomes.
description: The purpose of the Challenges of Safety and Transitions Study (COSTs) was to estimate the costs and consequences associated with criminal victimization among first-semester college students at minority-serving institutions (MSIs).
description: A cohort of 2,388 first-semester students from two minority-serving institutions in the United States completed three semi-annual online surveys between Fall 2021 and Fall 2022. Participants were asked a series of questions about the costs associated with victimization incidents that occurred prior to, and while enrolled at, one of the two subject universities. Responses were organized as both incident-level and person-level data. The researchers also collected official university enrollment and graduation data for participants during the data collection period.
A subset of 57 COSTS participants also participated in one of eight focus group interviews during the Summer and the Fall 2022 semester. These qualitative data are not included in the current ICPSR release (datasets 1 through 7).
description: These data include incident and person-level data on the costs associated with several forms of criminal victimization. The incident-level data files (DS2, DS4, DS6) include variables about perpetrator demographics, the context surrounding each victimization incident, and the outcomes of each incident. The outcome-related variables describe behavioral, emotional, and financial consequences of each incident. The person-level data files (DS3, DS5, DS7) include many of the same variables as the incident-level files, but organized by respondent rather than incident. The person-level files include additional variables about respondent demographics, enrollment status, perceptions of safety, mental health and emotional outcomes, risk behaviors, and willingness to pay for crime prevention.
description: Response Rates: The overall response rate for COSTs was 28 percent, consisting of 2,388 participants from 8,441 invitations.
description: To generate the COSTs sample, first semester students at each university were stratified
by classification upon entry (first year student vs. transfer student) and
first-generation student status (vs. continuing generation) using university
provided data at each university. At each university, students were disproportionately stratified at a 1:1 ratio for classification upon entry and first-generation student status to ensure large
enough subsamples for comparisons across first generation student status and
first year student status. Target enrollment was 1,200 students from each
university (i.e., 300 first-generation first year students, 300 first-generation
transfer students, 300 continuing generation first year students, and 300
continuing generation transfer students). 
Enrollment in COSTs occurred between October 2021 and December 2021 over a 12 week period. Upon invitation to
participate in the study, students were given three weeks to enroll before
replacement in the sample. Students were recruited by email, text, and phone
calls to participate in COSTs in the specific three-week period (round) until enrollment or written/verbal
refusal to participate. Four rounds of invitations to participate in COSTs occurred before
the target sample size was achieved. In each round, students were randomly
selected from each stratified sampling frame to participate in the study. In
Rounds 1 and 2, only 300 students from each sampling frame were randomly
selected for recruitment. Based on response rates from Round 1 and 2 (~29 percent),
students were oversampled within each strata in Round 3 and Round 4 to generate
the desired subgroup sample size before the end of the academic semester
(December 2021).
description: Datasets: 
DS0: Study-Level Files
DS1: COSTs Official Data
DS2: COSTs, Wave 1 Incident-Level Data
DS3: COSTs, Wave 1 Person-Level Data
DS4: COSTs, WAVE 2 Incident-Level Data
DS5: COSTs, WAVE 2 Person-Level Data
DS6: COSTs, Wave 3 Incident-Level Data
DS7: COSTs, Wave 3 Person-Level Data
description: Students at minority-serving institutions (MSIs) in the United States.
description: face-to-face interview; web-based surveyThis study also includes eight focus group interviews conducted during the Summer and Fall 2022 semesters. These qualitative data are not included in the current ICPSR release (datasets 1 through 7), but may be released in a future update.