A victim study (or victimization survey or victimization study) is a survey, such as the British Crime Survey, that asks a sample of people which crimes have been committed against them over a fixed period of time and whether or not they have been reported to the police.
Victim studies may be carried out at a national or local level.
This is one of the main ways in which the dark figure of crime is exposed particularly in cases of abuse.
Such surveys usually show the level of criminal activity is at least double that which appears in the official crime statistics.
A criticism of victim surveys is that there is no way of verifying information given by respondents.