To help illuminate some of the significant implications of the research, we have Reason Magazine's JD Tuccille joining us. He did a great piece on the study over at Reason and had several important insights.

For one, he said the study may undercut almost everything we think we know about guns in America. After all, it raised the possibility that as many as half of the people who told the researchers they didn't own a firearm really did. If that's the case, our view of gun ownership has been far too limited.

Tuccille also explained some major reasons gun owners may not want to tell researchers about their firearms. And there are several. Everything from concerns over the government getting ahold of the information to distrusting the motivations of academics at liberal universities.

Plus, Contributing Writer Jake Fogleman and I discuss the NYPD withholding gun permits even after the Supreme Court's latest Second Amendment ruling. And I talk about how the National Journalism Center's range day went (hint: pretty great).

Special Guest: JD Tuccille.

We are lucky enough to have Ohio State University PHD student, and lead author of the study, Sophie Kjaervik with us for this episode. She explained that kids in her experiment that watched a short gun safety video featuring a uniformed police officer were far less likely to pick up a real, but disabled, gun in a controlled setting than kids shown a car safety video with the same cop. And the difference was significant.

Kjaervik explained in depth how the researchers recruited the kids in the study, how they decided who watched which video, how they staged the guns, how they monitored the children, and collected data.

She also noted there were a few additional factors that signaled a kid would be less likely to handle the guns they found. Those included a dislike for guns, but also parents who owned guns and experience with some other form of gun safety training beforehand.

Overall, Kjaervik said the experiment showed that gun-safety videos are a viable way to prevent accidental shootings. But it also showed how efforts like the NRA's Eddie Eagle program could be improved.

Plus, Contributing Writer Jake Fogleman and I examine the ruling upholding San Jose's gun ownership tax and insurance mandate.

Special Guest: Sophie Kjaervik.

That brings us to this week's podcast. Georgetown Professor William English, who conducted the survey, joins us to discuss the details.

English said he wanted to update the evidence and address some common critiques of well-known gun owner surveys from a few decades ago. With new methods of carrying out scientific surveys, he was able to actually exceed those previous surveys by growing the number of respondents to the point where there were enough in every state to be representative. The massive sample size helped English deliver new insights on the diversity of gun ownership and how common gun carrying has become throughout the country.

It also backed up other evidence on how frequent defensive gun uses are and how many Americans own magazines that hold more than ten rounds. English said the gun owners he surveyed reported using a gun for self-defense about 50 million times, a number that works out to about 1.6 million per year. He also found that most gun owners have bought the kind of magazines targeted by bans in some blue states.

English also explained why he decided to use a survey to measure gun use and responded to some of the criticism self-reported self-defense incidents have faced over the years. He said his research on guns in America is only just getting started. He plans to publish several more papers on the study in addition to writing a book tackling the benefits and drawbacks of America's culture of civilian gun ownership.

Plus, Jake and I talk about Smith & Wesson's sales falling off a cliff last quarter and what it means for the company moving forward.

Special Guest: William English.