Start with abroad question

Does where you grow upinfluence your views

of the criminal justice system?

Conceptualizing theIndependent variable

"where you grow up" =environment

Dimension of environment:Region of U.S.

Attributes:West Coast, Northeast, South,

Southeast, Midwest

Dimension of environment:Type of community

Attributes:Rural, Suburban, Urban

Operationalizing

Indicators for region:State of residence, assigned to

regions (see attributes)

Indicators of community type:zip code, assigned to type (see

attributes)

Conceptualizing theDependent variable

"views of criminal justice system" =support for death penalty

Dimension of support:civic participation

Attributes:Voting in favor or against

Dimension of support:opinions

Attributes:Always support, in some cases,

in rare cases, always against

Operationalizing

Indicators for civic participation:Individual's voting record on

proposition banning death penalty

Indicators of opinions:Ordinal scale 0 to 4(0=always opposed,4=always in favor)

Now you are ready to re-state your broad question

How does the environment in which an individual lives

impact views on the death penalty?

What are some problemsor limits of my variables?