PUBLICATIONS

Stay Informed
Register with NCJRS to receive NCJRS's biweekly e-newsletter JUSTINFO and additional periodic emails from NCJRS and the NCJRS federal sponsors that highlight the latest research published or sponsored by the Office of Justice Programs.

NCJRS Abstract

The document referenced below is part of the NCJRS Virtual Library collection. To conduct further searches of the collection, visit the Virtual Library. See the Obtain Documents page for direction on how to access resources online, via mail, through interlibrary loans, or in a local library.

	NCJ Number:		NCJ 251227
	Title:		Computers Learn To Detect Financial Abuse of the Elderly
	URL(s):		HTML
	Corporate Author:		National Institute of Justice (NIJ) US Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs United States of America
	Date Published:		10/2017
	Page Count:		2
	Annotation:		This paper presents a summary description of NIJ-funded research that determined whether data from cases of suspected elder abuse can be supplied to a computer program that can determine whether financial abuse of the elderly person has occurred (“pure“ financial abuse), as well as whether financial abuse may have been accompanied by physical abuse (“hybrid” financial abuse).
	Abstract:		The research team used a statewide dataset of 8,800 confirmed cases of elder abuse in Texas that had been investigated by adult protective services agencies. The data were randomly split 80/20. The larger dataset was used to program the computer to detect patterns for financial exploitation and also differentiate between “pure” financial exploitation and “hybrid“ financial exploitation. The smaller dataset was used to test the computer models on accuracy in classifying the cases of financial exploitation. The researchers determined that the computer algorithms they developed were reliable in predicting clients who had experienced financial exploitation compared with those who had experienced other forms of elder abuse. The main factors that distinguished the financial exploitation from other abuse types were misuses of financial assets. In distinguishing between “pure” financial exploitation and “hybrid” financial exploitation, the computer algorithms made modest improvements in prediction accuracy compared to chance. The most significant factor that distinguished between “pure” and “hybrid” financial abuse was the presence of an apparent injury, such as bruises and skin tears. The researchers anticipate the data algorithms being transformed into web-based applications.
	Main Term(s):		Elderly victims
	Index Term(s):		Computer aided operations ; Crime detection ; Computer software ; Elder Abuse ; Computer aided investigations ; Multiple victimization ; Financial fraud
	Sale Source:		National Institute of Justice (NIJ) US Department of Justice 810 Seventh Street NW Office of Justice Programs Washington, DC 20531 United States of America
	Type:		Program/Project Description ; Research (Applied/Empirical)
	Country:		United States of America
	Language:		English
	Note:		The research described in this article is based on research funded under NIJ grant 2013-IJ-CX-0050 awarded to the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.
	To cite this abstract, use the following link: https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/Publications/abstract.aspx?ID=273407
*A link to the full-text document is provided whenever possible. For documents not available online, a link to the publisher's website is provided. Tell us how you use the NCJRS Library and Abstracts Database - send us your feedback.