Concealed Carrying on Campus in the Post–Virginia Tech Era: Dimensions of State Regulation and Differences in Contexts of Influence Within Them

Abstract

Debates over concealed carrying of guns on campus (CCOC) usually classify states as either “allowing” or “prohibiting” CCOC, thus ignoring research revealing state firearm regulatory frameworks are more nuanced. This study examined whether such subtleties existed in state CCOC regulatory frameworks by analyzing states’ 2018 CCOC regulatory provisions. Results showed that states used a multi-categorical restrictiveness-by-institutional discretion framework to regulate CCOC. In addition, indicators of intrastate contexts of influence (firearms, political, and religious) on regulatory policy differed across categories of restrictiveness and institutional discretion. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed significant differences in indicators of states’ political contexts, and post hoc comparisons of paired marginal means revealed significant differences in political indicators between states prohibiting CCOC and those allowing or those with mixed restrictiveness, and between states according schools full discretion and those according schools no discretion. Implications of the results are discussed for state-level research on firearms regulation and the ongoing CCOC debate.