Publication Date: February 2007
What does it say?
This study is the first nationally representative study to use state-level, survey-based estimates of household firearm ownership to look at the relationship between household gun ownership and homicide victimization across the 50 U.S. states. The study found that states with higher levels of people keeping a gun in the home had substantially higher levels of murder victims.
Consistent with several other studies it was found that women are more likely to be victims of homicide associated with keeping guns in the home.
The study’s findings suggest that “household firearms are a direct and indirect source of firearms used to kill Americans both in their homes and on their streets.”
How can I use it?
Two of every three American homicide victims are killed with firearms. The fact that states with higher rates of household gun ownership have higher rates of homicide victimization suggests that more must be done to restrict easy or unsafe access to guns in the home.
Citation
Miller, Matthew, David Hemenway, and Deborah Azrael., “State-Level Homicide Victimization Rates in the U.S. in Relation to Survey Measures of Household Firearm Ownership, 2001-2003,” Social Science and Medicine 64(3) (2007): 656-664