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An estimated three million adult American handgun owners carry a loaded firearm on a daily basis, and nine million do so on a monthly basis, a study has found.
A vast majority cited protection as the primary reason for carrying a firearm.
The study is the first in over 20 years to scrutinise why, how often, and in what manner US adults carry loaded handguns. It also examines how concealed handgun-carrying behaviour differs across states, depending on their laws.
Compared with handgun owners who did not carry, those who did report carrying handguns tended to be younger, and more often male, live in the southern US, have grown up in firearm-owning households, self-identify as politically conservative, and own more than one type of firearm.
Researchers reviewed handgun-carrying behaviour of 1,444 gun owners, using data from a 2015 nationally representative survey designed by Miller and Azrael.
"It was important to study handgun carrying because about 90 percent of all firearm homicides and nonfatal firearm crimes for which the type of firearm is known are committed with a handgun," said Rowhani-Rahbar.
When comparing handgun-carrying behaviour with corresponding states' laws, researchers found that proportionally fewer handgun owners carried a concealed handgun if they lived in a state whose laws afforded greater discretion to issuing agencies in the review of concealed- carry applications.
Rowhani-Rahbar said that more research is needed to comprehensively evaluate the impact of increasingly permissive firearm-carry laws.
Future studies should focus on analysing how different concealed-carry laws influence carrying, and characterising illegal carrying behaviour among those who have been denied permits.
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