Abstract
It is commonly accepted in academic literature that there is a correlation between a high gun ownership rate and high gun violence, or death rates, in a country. This theory is summarized by an article written in “Epidemiologic Reviews,” a leading review journal of public health, which states, “…specific restrictions on purchase, access, and use of firearms are associated with reductions in firearm deaths” (Santaella-Tenorio, Villaveces, Galea, & Cerdá, 2010); however, there is one an outlier of the theory. The case of Norway has the independent variable of this theory, in a sense that there is a high rate of gun ownership; however, Norway doesn’t have the expected outcome of high gun violence that should happen if this theory were to be true. Since the case is an outlier in this theory, it is a most likely case; there are the traits described in the theory without the expected outcome. There can be a coincidental correlation between two things; there may be other independent variables that are the cause of the event. In this case, a high rate of gun violence, or deaths, (the dependent variable) isn’t caused by the high rate of gun ownership (the independent variable). This shows that although Norway has a high gun ownership rate, it does not have a high gun violence rate. This is due to primarily three underlying independent variables: the Norwegian culture, citizen/government relationship, and education.