We begin our data analyses with some basic measurements of variables. First, we will examine three concepts: religiosity, political orientation, and attitudes toward abortion. We've chosen these on the basis of general interest and the possibilities they hold for taking a new look at some important questions of crime and justice.

In Part II, we will engage in univariate analysis, the analysis of one variable at a time. This is a basic act of measurement. In Chapter 4, for example, we will examine the different ways we might measure the religiosity of the respondents to the GSS, distinguishing the religious from the nonreligious and noting variations in between. In Chapter 5, ...