Examples of this type of crime are most frequently murder, manslaughter, sex offenses, assault, robbery, or attempts at such behavior. 16,000 Oklahoma incarcerated 552 persons per 100,000 residents in 1995, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics of the U.S. Department of Justice. This number has grown steadily from 323 per 100,000 in 1988 to the current figure. The Oklahoma rate of incarceration has very closely paralleled the state violent crime rate for the same periods. During this same time period Oklahoma has gone from 7th in the nation in 1988 to 3rd in the nation now for incarcerated inmates per 100,000 residents.
Research indicates that one possible explanation is that a southern subculture of violence exists.
See footnote below. Based on data from the 1983 General Social Survey, the current research indicates that native southerners are disproportionately inclined to condone defensive or retaliatory forms of violence. The results are partially consistent with arguments that interregional migration and cohort substitution attenuate regional differences in views toward violence. The fact that younger southern natives are considerably less supportive of violence than are elderly natives seems to validate earlier predictions that the regional subculture of violence will decline with national integration and economic development. The rate of females incarcerated in Oklahoma is 108 per 100,000 residents, the highest in the nation.