senior research paper

Jonathan MerrittFear in our hearts

The Fear in Our Hearts

Research Paper about Campus Carry

Jonathan Merritt

Ints: 3300

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Abstract

Campus carry is becoming law in the very near future and many people are uncertain

about how it will affect their daily lives. These fears include but are not limited to concerns about

who will be carrying firearms and what qualifications do they have. This paper looks at ways to

address people’s fears in order to help make the transition easier and to clarify what the laws and

regulations involved with it. Besides education about laws this paper also looks at if general

firearms education might be a good idea. All of this looks at reducing people’s fears through

increased understanding and tolerance on both sides.

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Step 1: State the Focus Question

Campus carry is a very hot top at the moment due to the amount of media attention that

it is receiving. First thing I would like to discuss about campus carry is to distinguish it from

open carry a related but completely separate topic as far as this paper is concerned. Campus carry

is the right to carry a fire arm concealed into a campus building. Open carry is the right to openly

carry a fire arm in a holster in plain view. These are two separate laws and I feel that it is

appropriate to give this vague description to clarify. The topic of conceal carry is not new to

Texas and even carrying on college grounds is not new. The only new aspect of it is that it will

become legal to carry into buildings. Before this law passed in the state of Texas it was legal to

carry on college campuses as long as a person didn’t enter a building. Because of this I feel that

it is partly the notoriety from the media that has brought attention to this topic because the law is

not a huge change from what is currently in place. However, the large amount of attention this

has drawn is making people think about this issue and have very opinionated discussions about

this topic. The question proposed by this research study is, how can the fear surrounding campus

carry be addressed so that students and faculty will not feel endangered by those carrying

legally? For instance one of the big areas that people are concerned about guns popping up is

businesses around campuses even though carry is already legal at these businesses, excluding

bars and such that are excluded already under laws already in place. Are they just now realizing

this is a concern of theirs because of campus carry and is it actually changing how they operate?

Why is it campus carry that inspires fear in people when they can walk down the street or go to a

movie and not be concerned about if the person next to them is carrying? Is in the fact someone

might be carrying next to them that bothers them or that they have now been made aware of it.

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This paper will look at how fear plays a part in people’s opinions, both for and against, as well as

if they choose to carry and the impact this will have on students.

Step 2: Justify an Interdisciplinary Approach

This problem will require a multi-disciplinary approach to solve this problem because

there is a need to gather information from multiple disciplines. This paper will need psychology

and communications to carry out my research. Psychology will be very useful in figuring out

how campus carry affects the moral of students on campus. Communications will be the

application of the knowledge found in psychological insights to implement a real world solution.

Step3: Identify Relevant Disciplines

This step focuses on finding possible relevant disciplines then choosing several to focus

in on. Possible disciplines that may be relevant are criminal justice, psychology, communication,

anthropology, and education. Criminal justice could provide insights to the laws and regulations

concerning campus carry. While this information would be useful it will not help solve the

problem of peoples fear. Anthropology could provide insights to the culture of Texas and the

culture of Tech. This information does not help on an individual basis and would only help if the

culture of Texas was anti-gun to begin with. Education is useful for getting education to people

there are aspects of other disciplines that can do the same job adequately for this application.

Communication has several theories that can be useful to this subject and will one of the two

disciplines that will be used in this paper. The second discipline that will be used is psychology

as it also has several useful attributes and theories such as injury reduction theory.

Step 4: Literature Search

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The article is written from the perspective of criminal justice perspective as it looks at

reasons that criminal justice majors would want to carry concealed both on campus and off. The

journal the article was published in is also a criminal justice journal. The reason this article is

included in my paper is that finding out the reason someone would want to carry on campus

while this article pertains to reasons criminal justice majors would want to carry they use

information in their research that was made across all majors. The research methods are not

explicitly stated but the results given in the article are presented quantitatively so it can be

assumed that the survey given out had a likard scale or similar means of measuring the opinion

of the students surveyed at the two universities.

The findings of this article as related to who would want to carry is that people that are

more afraid of violence being committed on campus are the ones that are most likely to go out

and get a chl and carry on campus. Also there was a trend that white males also showed a

preference for firearm ownership as well as wanting to carry on campus (BJA 2012 PP 296) in

addition people that had been victimized on campus would also be more likely to seek out a CHL

and carry. (BJA 2012 PP 300) the summary of this article is that can be applied to my article is

finding a demographic that would want to get a CHL and those who would not. This information

would be useful when developing what demographic should be used to find people that are ok

with carry other places but have a problem with carry on campus. (Bouffard, J. A., Nobles, M.

R., & Wells, W. 2012).

The authors of this article are from health areas of study and the journal is a general

health journal (JACH pp 244). The phenomenon that this article looks at is what students think

about conceal carry on campuses and how it would affect them as well as who would be most

likely to carry concealed. The most detailed part of the research is a several page questionnaire

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that asks students their opinion on how safe they feel on campus and how conceal carry being

allowed would affect this. This several page survey used a likard scale so that the researches

could quantify the information they collected. The research method used is quantitative method

as shown by the survey used to gather data. There are no theories stated in this article.

The phenomenon that applies to the paper is student opinions as they refer to campus

carry and how they feel about campus safety as it stands. This article starts by saying how they

developed the sample that they used in both studies. Then goes into how they gathered data in

each study. The second study about student opinion was given out through several different

means on different campuses to get an adequate sample of different students. This study takes the

information and turns it into percent data that can be easily read for each question. The data

shows that a majority of students feel that while they don’t think that campus police can handle

the threat of violence on campus they do not support campus carry. They do not feel like it will

make them safer and would be uncomfortable if they knew a student had a gun with them on

campus. (Thompson, A., Price, J. H., Dake, J. A., Teeple, K., Bassler, S., Khubchandani, J., & ...

Stratton, C. 2013).

The disciplinary background of the authors was not stated however the journal is a

criminal justice journal. The phenomenon that pertains to the paper is the portion that pertains to

faculty of university campuses and their opinions on campus carry. This is another information

gathering survey with no stated theory. The information gathered in this article was through a

survey that they sent to every faculty member through email. This article is over house bill 89 in

Georgia not campus carry in Texas therefore half of this article pertains to carry in places of

worship. The part that will be used in this paper is the part pertaining to the opinions of faculty

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members of a university. Through the survey they conducted they found that most of the faculty

was in fact against this bill. (Bennett, K., Kraft, J., & Grubb, D. 2012).

This article is about determining whether or not a person is capable of carrying a fire arm

due to physical or mental limitations and if doctors can determine this. The discipline affiliation

of the article is behavioral science and health. The phenomena that relates the paper is the study

of whether or not a physician can determine if someone can carry a gun mentally. There is no

theory stated. The research method they used was to survey different physicians first to find out

if a physician even feels competent to determine if a person can carry.

In this article the goal was to find out if a physician felt competent in giving a verdic on if a

person was fit to carry. Through the survey they conducted most physicians were not

comfortable making a judgement on mental health. While they felt more competint making

decisions based on physical health there doesn’t appear to be any guide lines to determine what

allows people to carry in states that require a physician to sign off. Where some doctors refused

others would still allow a patient to carry and all of the reasons varied greatly in severity and

ranged from physical to mental deficiencies.(Goldstein, A. O., Viera, A. J., Pierson, J.,

Barnhouse, K. K., Tulsky, J. A., & Richman, B. D. 2015).

This article was in a psychological journal and the point was to gain an understanding of

college age people’s opinions of fire arms and conceal carry in three countries. The opinion of

firearms in US is important to my research because a person’s perspective on a topic can greatly

affect how that effects their mental state when they know that it is near and they perceive it is a

threat. The method used was a quantitative survey.

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The article used a quantitative survey to determine what a person’s opinions on firearms

were. To do this they took all variables they wanted to look at and quantified them by putting

them into a likard scale. The findings they found as it pertains to the US is that it was more pro-

gun than the other countries but most people age 19-25 have a negative opinion about firearms.

They looked at this in three categories which are rights protection and crime. (Cooke, C. A.

2004).

This is a quantitative study that seeks to look at if the perceived amount of people with

firearms and particularly conceal carry decreases crime rate. This is a criminal justice article

published in a social science journal. The research method used is quantitative as it looks at

statistics in different states with different laws to see if crime rates vary.

The study starts by categorizing states by how difficult it is to acquire a conceal carry

permit. The three categories are shall issue may issue no permit required. It then shows that the

increase in civilians with guns should increase risk of crime and therefore decrease crime rates.

The perceived number of conceal carry persons in each state should then affect the crime rates

(Fortunato, D. 2015).

Step five: Developing Adequacy

First before any research can be done adequacy in the disciplines must be established.

This is vital in interdisciplinary research as a person would need to understand a discipline well

enough to not only know the relevant theories but also where and how they will overlap with

other disciplines being used.

First discipline that this paper will look at is communications and a few theories that will

be useful in solving the problem of fear surrounding campus carry. One of the theories that are

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important to this is agenda setting theory. This theory is more related to the media side of

communications and states that people will pay more attention to a topic that the media says is

important or gives attention to. This theory will very likely come into play due to the amount of

media coverage that campus carry has gotten. Another theory that will be used particularly to

develop a method of getting information out to the people who need it will be adult learning

theory. Adult learning theory is a theory focused on how to teach adult learners in the most

effective way. The third communication theory that will be used in this research is

communication privacy management theory which is a theory that is all about how people decide

what information they will share and with whom. The topic of conceal carry is one a lot of

people on both sides of the argument may not want to share certain information for different

reasons and knowledge of this theory will help to navigate possibly difficult conversations.

Next step is to develop adequacy in psychology and theories useful to creating a real

world solution to the problem of conceal carry. One insight taken from psychology that could be

of great use in this situation is the three steps of damage prevention (Berger, K. S. 2014 pp 244.).

If someone were to look at fear as an injury then a process could be developed for addressing the

problem. First step in this is to prevent situations where fear can take place. Since the option of

not allowing people to carry is no longer an option since it would be the most obvious solution

there is a need to consider new solution for this step. Education can reduce fear in people as

shown in a research article pertaining to women’s education about child birth and elected C-

section due to fear. (Navaee, M., & Abedian pp40.) While this article is not related to campus

carry it does show that education can reduce fear. Therefore an educational seminar or similar

session could be developed that could help alleviate the general fear of firearms being on

campus. The second method of injury prevention is to reduce danger in high risk situations. A

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high risk situation for this fear could be a great number of things however one example could be

student suspecting another student is carrying on campus. This fear is more specific and could be

targeted toward just that one person they are uncomfortable with or maybe seeing a firearm. The

type of education a person receives can be more effective than just a general seminar. If a person

engages in role play that is related to the event they are afraid of then that can help alleviate fear

more effectively. A person may want to take a gun safety course to expose them to fire arms in a

safe controlled environment. Third step of injury prevention is to minimize the damage once it

has been done. In this case once their worst fears have been realized which would be a discharge

of a firearm on campus in their presence. Depending on the nature of the discharge and or event

of a shooting this step can take many different directions that could be entire papers on their

own. In general talking to a counselor or similar treatment would most likely be the best option

in this scenario. This is the psychological insight that will be taken and used in this paper.

Step Six: Evaluate the Problem and Insight into it

In this step the paper will cover what insights are given by the source information in the

Literature review and how they relate to the research question of how can the fear surrounding

campus carry be addressed? With campus carry becoming legal later this year some students may

have to face a large fear of theirs in order to receive an education.

Psychology is a study of how the human mind works. If someone has an over bearing

fear of guns this could prevent them from receiving an education if they don’t have the means to

go to a university that still prohibits campus carry. Communication is the tool that will allow

clinical treatment of patients. Interpersonal communication in particular is the means that a

counselor uses to give treatment so to speak.

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The first article I will take insight from is GUN CULTURES, MAJORITY

NATIONALISM, AND THE PROMINENCE OF FEAR: REFLECTIONS ON ANTI-SIKH

HATE CRIMES. This article defines the American gun culture by doing a qualitative evaluation

of it and comparing it to a separate gun culture in a province in India. The comparison is made

by looking at the base reason why people in these regions own firearms. The insights found in

this is that gun cultures can exist for different reasons and just because guns are present in one

area might be a sign of violence doesn’t mean that it is in a different area. This study may also be

used as a base to see if high crime areas have a similar gun culture to that of an unstable political

area. This article is a base of where a student or faculty member’s fear may come from.

The next article I took psychological insight from is Differences Across Majors in the

Desire to Obtain a License to Carry a Concealed Handgun on Campus: Implications for Criminal

Justice Education. Journal Of Criminal Justice Education. Even though this is a criminal justice

article it is over the reasons a person would consider carrying a weapon on campus. One of the

reasons a person would want to carry on campus is that they are afraid of crime being committed

against them while on campus grounds. It also covers that victims of crime are more likely to

carry a weapon to prevent them from becoming victims again. It is fear of criminals that drives

people to carry as well as fear that drives people to be afraid of people carrying weapons.

Somewhere there is a disconnect in communication as to why people carry and why people think

they carry. There may be a psychological difference in how the two groups address fear and react

to it.

The next article is Can Easing Concealed Carry Deter Crime? This article looks at crime

statistics in different states to see if the perception of number of people with a CHL changes the

crime rate in comparable areas this insight found in this is how people perceive a state that has a

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perceived large number of CHL holders. This give a psychological insight to people that don’t

follow laws and are looking to commit crimes. This show whether or not it changes their

decision on whether or not to commit crime. Fear is induced in the criminals knowing that if they

try to rob someone that person may be armed and retaliates against them. This creates another

group of people that will be afraid of conceal carry while not a focus of this paper should be

acknowledged as it may be a factor that can help a person fearful of fire arms to be accepting of

them for positive reasons.

These are three psychological insights drawn from sources that could help solve the

problem of fear and uncertainty surrounding campus carry. Maybe they can help find a middle

ground that everyone can accept and move forward with no loss on either side.

The next step is to take insights from communications and apply them to the problem of

fear surrounding campus carry. The insights that will be most useful from this discipline are

those surrounding adult education and learning. First insight that will be looked at it’s the law of

effect, (Beebe, S. A., Mottet, T. P., & Roach, D. K. 2013 pp. 28) which states that people will

learn better in an environment that they are comfortable in. This is important to remember as a

program is developed since the participants most likely are already afraid and uncomfortable

with this subject. Next is the law of readiness, (Beebe, S. A., Mottet, T. P., & Roach, D. K. 2013

pp. 31) which states that the learner is more likely to learn if it is something the learners need to

learn. To make use of this law the people attending the information session must know that it

will be something that will increase their understanding of the situation. For example there

would need to be different sessions based on how much knowledge a person already has on the

subject. Therefore a person that grew up around fire arms would need a different set of

information than someone who has never even seen a firearm. Third adult learning or Andragogy

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has five assumptions that must be taken into consideration when designing a session aimed at

teaching adults. (Beebe, S. A., Mottet, T. P., & Roach, D. K. 2013 pp. 33) One adult learners

need to know why they are learning something. Two Adult learners bring years of experience to

the classroom. Three Adult learners tend to be self-motivated. Four Adults know their own

deficiencies and they know what they need to learn to become successful. Five adults are

problem centered learners. These insights will be very useful in creating a information session or

short class that can give information to a large group of people that are afraid of the

implementation of campus carry.

Step 7: Finding Conflict between Disciplines

In this section conflict between the disciplines being used in this paper will be discussed.

The two disciplines are psychology and communications these two separate disciplines on the

surface have quite a bit in common but once a person gets deeper into them they begin to

diverge. The conflict between communications and psychology can be found in how both

address fear. In communication fear is a reaction to a message that has been received by an

individual. It does not see it as a problem only as a response to a stimulus. Psychology looks a

fear in a more in depth manner and in a situation such as the one investigated in this paper it sees

it as a problem that needs to be solved.

Step 8: Create or Discover Common Ground

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The similar insights will look at how best to relay information between the two groups of

people for and against conceal carry so that the fears of those against can be alleviated while not

impleading the ability of those who wish to carry. The resolution of the two different approaches

to fear is that both psychology and communications address fear as a response to a stimulus.

Therefore both disciplines would have similar ways or reducing or eliminating the effect of fear.

These methods include education as a viable way to reduce or eliminate fear. (Navaee, M., &

Abedian, Z. 2015 p 40).

Step 9: Construct a more comprehensive understanding

This is where the integration of communications and psychology come together to form

new knowledge or perspective on the problem of campus carry and specifically how people’s

fears can be addressed and put at ease so that they can receive an education free of fear. There

are two groups that can be identified in this problem these groups are those against, which is the

largest, and the smaller group is those that plan to carry. The concept of fear was most prevalent

throughout the literature on both sides of the argument weather it was people afraid of people

carrying or people afraid of becoming victims of crimes and wanting to carry to prevent that.

While fear was seen throughout the literature that I found none of it was addressed as the

problem. Most of the literature was focused on other aspects that while important are not part of

what this research is seeks to understand. Fear is an important factor because it seems to be one

of the driving factors for both people that want to carry and those who are against it. Fear is a

very approachable way to address this problem because fear can be conquered and overcome

giving the problem a face that can be beaten.

Step 10: communicating the results

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This common idea of fear is one that can be addressed and put at ease by gathering

information and getting it to the public. This information would include reasons why people

carry and crime statistics surrounding CHL carriers in the state of Texas. Another means that

could be used could be an open discussion between the two groups that are in conflict and allow

for a dialog between them that can lead to an understanding. This paper looks at the possibilities

of addressing this problem from a person’s fear which is a driving force for many people.

The strength of this paper is that it looks at the problem of campus carry from a different

way than other literature that is currently out there by looking at this problem from psychology

of fear. This is a different perspective then the political or legal perspectives that are most

commonly looked at. The weakness of this paper is that while the literature found noted that fear

was a motivator it was not from one of the perspectives of the paper therefore insights had to be

taken from outside the perspectives and made to fit the perspectives used in the paper.

Fear can be a debilitating thing one that could prevent a person from doing something

important to their success such as receives an education. This research could help a person

overcome the fear they have surrounding this problem and live their lives free of this fear. It will

alleviate this fear with facts and not bias opinions so that people will feel secure in their beliefs.

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Annotated Bibliography

Arrigo, B. A., & Acheson, A. (2016). Concealed carry bans and the American college campus: a

law, social sciences, and policy perspective. Contemporary Justice Review, 19(1), 120-141.

doi:10.1080/10282580.2015.1101688

Beebe, S. A., Mottet, T. P., & Roach, D. K. (2013). Training and Development Communicating

for success (2ndnd ed., pp. 27-38). New Jersey, NJ: Pearson.

Bennett, K., Kraft, J., & Grubb, D. (2012). University Faculty Attitudes Toward Guns on

Campus. Journal Of Criminal Justice Education, 23(3), 336-355.

doi:10.1080/10511253.2011.590515

Berger, K. S. (2014). The Developing Person Through childhood (6thth ed., pp. 244-245). New

York, NY: Worth Publishers.

Bouffard, J. A., Nobles, M. R., & Wells, W. (2012). Differences Across Majors in the Desire to

Obtain a License to Carry a Concealed Handgun on Campus: Implications for Criminal Justice

Education. Journal Of Criminal Justice Education, 23(3), 283-306.

doi:10.1080/10511253.2011.610760

Cavanaugh, M. R., Bouffard, J. A., Wells, W., & Nobles, M. R. (2012). Student Attitudes

Toward Concealed Handguns on Campus at 2 Universities. American Journal Of Public Health,

102(12), 2245-2247. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2011.300473

Cooke, C. A. (2004). Young people's attitudes towards guns in America, Great Britain, and

Western Australia. Aggressive Behavior,30(2), 93-104. doi:10.1002/ab.20009

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Duwe, G., Kovandzic, T., & Moody, C. E. (2002). The Impact of Right-to-Carry Concealed

Firearm Laws on Mass Public Shootings. Homicide Studies, 6(4), 271.

doi:10.1177/108876702237341

Fennell, R. (2009). Concealed Carry Weapon Permits: A Second Amendment Right or a Recipe

for Disaster on Our Nation's Campuses?. Journal Of American College Health, 58(2), 99-100.

Fortunato, D. (2015). Can Easing Concealed Carry Deter Crime?*. Social Science Quarterly

(Wiley-Blackwell), 96(4), 1071-1085. doi:10.1111/ssqu.12166

Goldstein, A. O., Viera, A. J., Pierson, J., Barnhouse, K. K., Tulsky, J. A., & Richman, B. D.

(2015). Physician Beliefs about Physical and Mental Competency of Patients Applying for

Concealed Weapon Permits. Behavioral Sciences & The Law, 33(2/3), 238-245.

doi:10.1002/bsl.2169

Mahmood, C. K. (2012). GUN CULTURES, MAJORITY NATIONALISM, AND THE

PROMINENCE OF FEAR: REFLECTIONS ON ANTI-SIKH HATE CRIMES. Sikh

Formations: Religion, Culture, Theory, 8(3), 275-279. doi:10.1080/17448727.2012.752675

Navaee, M., & Abedian, Z. (2015). Effect of role play education on primiparous women's fear of

natural delivery and their decision on the mode of delivery. Iranian Journal Of Nursing &

Midwifery Research, 20(1), 40-46.

Phillips, C. D., Nwaiwu, O., McMaughan Moudouni, D. K., Edwards, R., & Lin, S. (2013).

When Concealed Handgun Licensees Break Bad: Criminal Convictions of Concealed Handgun

Licensees in Texas, 2001-2009. American Journal Of Public Health, 103(1), 86-91.

doi:10.2105/AJPH.2012.300807

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Sulkowski, M. L., & Lazarus, P. J. (2011). Contemporary Responses to Violent Attacks on

College Campuses. Journal Of School Violence, 10(4), 338-354.

doi:10.1080/15388220.2011.602601

Thompson, A., Price, J. H., Dake, J. A., Teeple, K., Bassler, S., Khubchandani, J., & ... Stratton,

C. (2013). Student Perceptions and Practices Regarding Carrying Concealed Handguns on

University Campuses. Journal Of American College Health, 61(5), 243-253.

doi:10.1080/07448481.2013.799478

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