Forecasting mass shootings

Can mass shootings be forecasted? Mohammad R.K. Mofrad and colleagues constructed an agent-based model of mass shootings within a Bayesian inference framework. In the model, a shooting arises from the intersection of three factors: the emergence of a motivated potential perpetrator, access to firearms, and the presence of a suitable target population. Based on demographic data from the U.S. Census, a per-capita rate of perpetrator emergence was estimated jointly with other model parameters. Access to firearms was modeled using the local density of Federal Firearms License (FFL) holders as a proxy and emerged as the dominant predictor of risk within the model.

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