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This study examines the ecological reliability, convergent validity and ecological stability of neighbourhood (dis)organizational processes measured by means of two methods: inhabitant surveys and the so-called key informant analysis technique. Considering that ecological processes play a major role in many contemporary criminological theories and research, it is vital to take into account methodological challenges and to question the reliability, validity and stability of the measures reflecting these underlying processes. (Dis)organizational processes are predominantly measured by means of questionnaires surveying neighbourhood inhabitants. To yield ecologically reliable and valid measures this approach requires large numbers of respondents. In this study we analyse the relationships between ecological measures of neighbourhood processes based on surveys of inhabitants versus key informants. The findings suggest that key informants can provide reliable, valid and stable measures of (dis)organizational neighbourhood processes. Therefore, the key informant analysis technique is an essential complementary, or even substitutive, method in the measurement of neighbourhood processes; shared survey-method variance is eliminated and it is possible to survey fewer key informants than inhabitants to obtain reliable and valid information on social trust and disorder. Nevertheless, this method is not suitable for measuring all neighbourhood processes, such as informal social control. Therefore, outstanding challenges and avenues for future research are discussed as well.

Shaw and McKay advanced social disorganization theory in the 1930s, kick-starting a large body of research on communities and crime. Studies emphasize individual impacts of poverty, residential instability, and racial/ethnic heterogeneity by examining their independent effects on crime, adopting a variable-centered approach. We use a “neighborhood-centered” approach that considers how structural forces combine into unique constellations that vary across communities, with consequences for crime. Examining neighborhoods in Southern California we: (1) identify neighborhood typologies based on levels of poverty, instability, and heterogeneity; (2) explore how these typologies fit within a disorganization framework and are spatially distributed across the region; and (3) examine how these typologies are differentially associated with crime. Results reveal nine neighborhood types with varying relationships to crime.

Objective: Examine the place-based correlates of robbery activity displaced by a foot-patrol intervention in Newark, NJ. We use constructs from Crime Pattern and Social Disorganization theories to test hypotheses concerned with associations between the structure of the environment and the displacement of crime. Method: Robbery incidents were spatially joined to street segments to study micro-level displacement processes. Predictor variables were operationalized using data from the Newark Police Department and Infogroup USA. Generalized Linear models tested associations between the characteristics of street segments and displaced robbery in the target area as compared to a control. Results: Environmental structure is important to understanding the settings of displacement, though this varied between spatial and temporal displacement. Relationships between displaced crime activity and model covariates did not always appear in expected directions. For example, bus stops predicted increased spatial displacement while corner stores predicted decreased levels of temporal displacement. Conclusions: While testing for displacement has become commonplace in place-based policing interventions, less attention has been paid to the micro-level factors that may facilitate the displacement of crime events. Both bus stops and corner stores show consistent associations with displaced crime activity, but the directions of these relationships suggest more complex processes requiring further examination.

Objectives:Explanations of community violence traditionally reflect a social disorganization perspective, suggesting that neighborhood characteristics affect crime via the intervening mechanism of informal social control. Drawing on Agnew’s Macro Strain Theory [MST], we argue that neighborhood characteristics 1) also affect macro-level crime for reasons related to aggregated strain and 2) condition the relationship between micro-level strains and individual violent offending.Methods:Using data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods, we conduct a series of multilevel models examining both the macro- and multi-level relationship between neighborhood characteristics, strain and youth violence.Findings:Results generally support our arguments, suggesting that neighborhood characteristics like concentrated disadvantage 1) remain associated with community violence even after adjusting for multiple measures of informal social control and 2) condition the association between micro-level strain and violent offending.Conclusions:Strain processes, at both the macro and micro-level, play a critical role in the well-established empirical relationship between structural disadvantage and violence. In light of results, community crime control policies should address the ways in which structural disadvantage increases motivation, rather than focusing exclusively on the ways in which it weakens informal social control.

Objectives: To determine whether criminogenic “edges,” as defined by crime pattern theory, exist at points of sharp contrast of socioeconomic status (SES). Methods: The study uses a quasi-experimental design with pattern matching logic. A series of negative binomial regression models separately examine five different crimes with an economic incentive as dependent variables, and five crimes without an economic incentive as nonequivalent dependent variables, to determine whether census block groups of predominantly and comparatively higher SES than the wider surrounding area experience greater reported rational crime than would otherwise be expected. Results: The census block groups of comparatively higher SES located within and/or near areas of predominantly lower SES experienced one of the five crimes with an economic incentive, robberies by firearm, 40 percent more frequently than would otherwise be expected. Conclusions: The study’s findings are partially consistent with its hypothesis, which is grounded in crime pattern, rational choice, routine activities, and social disorganization theories. The findings encourage future research that may extend the definition of an “edge” under crime pattern theory as well as research at the intersection of criminological theories.

The notion that immigrants are more crime prone or increase crime has been largely debunked by criminologists over the last two decades. However, there is a lack of contemporary research on explaining perceptions of immigrant criminality, specifically. This study examines the factors that relate to American’s belief that immigrants increase crime rates in local communities. Using weighted blocked logistic regression analyses, this study found that individual factors related to identity (e.g. race, gender, age, religion, etc.) were not significant predictors of the view that immigrants increase crime. Instead, individuals who believe immigrants are a burden to society, already have negative views of immigrants, and are more resistant to societal and cultural change are more likely to believe this falsehood. Overall, the findings offer partial support for the social disorganization and conflict perspectives, with the latter receiving the most support. Economic competition hypotheses received no support.

Although offenders’ individual-level characteristics such as attenuated family bonds and financial difficulty undermine the reentry process, these factors represent only part of the story. A complete and comprehensive understanding of reentry requires us to examine the communities to which they return. This study applies the systemic model of social disorganization theory to the reentry context. Specifically, I access the roles of private, parochial, and public levels of social control in individuals’ reentry. Findings suggest that when analyzed in separate models, all three levels of social control exhibited significant effects on recidivism. However, when accessed simultaneously in one model, private and public levels of social control but not community social control exhibited significant effects on individuals’ recidivism.

Purpose Using both crime pattern and social disorganization theories, the current study investigates the characteristics of those places that experience high counts of reported sexual crime to police. Methods Socio-demographic factors, land use, specific sexual crime attractors, and ecological variables are used to predict dissemination areas with high counts of sexual crime within a large city using 2180 founded crime events retrieved from a Canadian police database. Results Socio-demographic and ecological factors, as well as the presence of particular sexual crime attractors, characterize these neighborhoods. For example, dissemination areas that have higher percentages of female, male, and single residents, as well as higher counts of rental units, bars, and schools, experience more sexual crimes. Land use does not predict dissemination areas with high counts of sexual crime. Conclusions Both crime pattern and social disorganization theories provide a framework within which the nature of sexual crime places can be better understood. This information could be used to empower community members as to the types of places that are the riskiest for crimes of this nature, as well as to create a conversation about interventions that could be put in place at both the secondary and tertiary levels to prevent future occurrences.

Objectives:We draw upon theories of social disorganization, strain, and subculture of violence to examine how sex and race/ethnicity intersect to inform nonlethal violent offending at the macrolevel.Methods:Using neighborhood-level incidents, we examine (1) the structural correlates of male and female nonlethal violence and (2) whether ecological conditions have variable impacts on the prevalence of White, Black, and Latino male and female offenses above and beyond differential exposure to disadvantage. We use multivariate negative binomial regression within a structural equation modeling framework which allows for the examination of the same set of indicator variables on more than one dependent variable simultaneously while accounting for covariance between the dependent variables.Results:We find few significant differences in the salience of disadvantage on female and male violence across race and ethnicity although some differences emerge for White men and women. Structural factors are largely sex invariant within race and ethnicity.Conclusions:Despite expectations that disadvantage would have differential effects across sex and race/ethnicity, we uncover only minor differences. This suggests that structural effects are more invariant than variant across subgroups and highlights the importance of investigating both similarities and differences when examining neighborhood structure, intersectionality, and criminal behavior.

Breaking away from a focus on the influence of individual characteristics on animal cruelty and guided by social disorganization theory, we investigated animal cruelty violations in block g...

Using longitudinal data from a British longitudinal cohort study (ALSPAC), the current study examines “developmental domains” from individual, peer, and community risk factors. Using four logistic ...

Urban sociologists and criminologists have long been interested in the link between neighborhood isolation and crime. Yet studies have focused predominantly on the internal dimension of social isolation (i.e., increased social disorganization and insufficient jobs and opportunities). This study highlights the need to assess the external dimension of neighborhood isolation, the disconnectedness from other neighborhoods in the city. Analyses of Chicago's neighborhood commuting network over twelve years (2002-2013) showed that violence predicted network isolation. Moreover, pairwise similarity in neighborhood violence predicted commuting ties, supporting homophily expectations. Violence homophily affected tie formation most, while neighborhood violence was important in dissolving ties.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore factors that shape police behavior in juvenile interactions occurring in rural communities. Design/methodology/approach Using data collected in rural Kentucky through a factorial survey instrument, this study assessed the effects of situational, officer, organizational and community variables on officers’ authoritative and supportive behavior toward juveniles. Findings Officer background characteristics, such as race, sex, education, and having children, and occupational attitudes, such as rehabilitation and dispositional beliefs, were significantly related to both authoritative and supportive behavior. While organizational variables affected officer supportive actions, they were weakly linked to authoritative behavior. Neighborhood social disorganization was ineffective in predicting both types of police behavior. Originality/value Although a considerable amount of research has been conducted in the past several decades to examine police behavior, a relatively small number of studies have empirically assessed factors that shape police behavior toward juveniles with an even smaller number assessing juvenile interactions in rural communities. This research provides a comprehensive theoretical explanation of police-juvenile encounters in rural communities which will allow for a more complete understanding of the factors that account for police attitudes and behavior in these interactions.

Hispanics are frequently categorized under one homogeneous group in existing intimate partner violence research, presenting a challenge for practitioners and researchers interested in assessing potentially unique public health concerns of each subgroup. Using the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, this study examined the family- and community-related determinants of intimate partner violence experienced by mothers of Mexican and Puerto Rican descent. The respondents' self-reported physical violence and power control are two key measures of IPV. Our study found statistical differences between the Mexican and Puerto Rican origin respondents' experiences with IPV. Specifically, father infidelity and parenting concordance functioned as risk and protective factors, respectively, for the Mexican origin mothers' experiences of relational violence. In the case of the Puerto Rican origin respondents, higher level of spousal support, collective efficacy, and social disorganization were linked to less violence, while increased emotional distance and higher level of baseline education were associated with more violence.

Objective: To date, much of what we know about the immigration–crime link is based on the United States setting. Yet, contextual features unique to the United States may produce distinct outcomes for immigration and crime that do not hold elsewhere. This study therefore tests the applicability of ecological frameworks largely derived from the United States experience (such as the immigration revitalization thesis) in a country with a greater mixture of ethnic groups and where immigration policy is focused on recruiting skilled immigrants. Methods: Utilizing an innovative hybrid modeling approach, this article draws on three waves of census data and nine years of official recorded crime incident data to examine the effect of immigration on violent crime across 882 neighborhoods located in two Australian cities. Results: The results offer little evidence that neighborhoods with a greater concentration of immigrants have more crime or that increases in the immigrant population over time are associated with increased violence. Diversity however appears to have a more problematic effect on violent crime in both cities. Conclusions: While these findings are relatively consistent with previous research in the United States, whether this similarity is due to a process of revitalization requires further investigation.

Social scientists have long known that crime is higher in minority versus White neighborhoods. Predominant accounts of this pattern invoke a racial invariance thesis, which posits that (1) accounting for inequalities in structural disadvantages substantially diminishes ethno-racial gaps in neighborhood crime and (2) key predictors operate uniformly across neighborhoods of different ethno-racial types. Unfortunately, little work examines the second assertion of racial invariance, leaving conclusions about the thesis tentative. We address this omission with unique data from the National Neighborhood Crime Study that includes information on neighborhood levels of property and violent crime for majority White, Black, Latino, minority, and integrated neighborhoods nested within a representative sample of 87 large cities. Findings show notable similarity in the influence of key predictors of both violent and property crime across the five ethno-racial neighborhoods. When differences are detected, they are due generally to magnitude and not direction. On the whole our work provides healthy support for a perspective that traces ethno-racial disparity in crime across neighborhoods to the structural underpinnings of urban inequality.

This article asks if an “air of injustice,” created by the disproportionate (and often negative) encounters with police in African American communities, leads to violence? An integrated theoretical model drawing upon social disorganization, collective efficacy, and macro strain theories as well as the recent theory of African American offending, is presented as a new theory of violence in African American communities. The primary tenants are then assessed with the community survey of the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods. Findings support the integrated model and significance of an “air of injustice” as an additional predictor of neighborhood violence beyond community characteristics and social conditions, particularly for African American communities. Theoretical and empirical implications are discussed.

Police response time to calls for service is a crucial factor in evaluation of police performance. While domestic violence is now considered serious interpersonal violence, factors associated with response time to domestic violence incidents are underexplored. Using hierarchical linear modeling, over 10,000 cases of calls for service for domestic violence across 438 census tracts in Houston, Texas, were examined. The result of multilevel analysis revealed that complainant’s race, weapon involvement, and day and time of incidents were associated with response time at the situational level. At the neighborhood level, concentrated disadvantage, immigration concentration, and residential stability were significantly associated with response time.

Objectives: This study explores preference variation in location choice strategies of residential burglars. Applying a model of offender target selection that is grounded in assertions of the routine activity approach, rational choice perspective, crime pattern and social disorganization theories, it seeks to address the as yet untested assumption that crime location choice preferences are the same for all offenders. Methods: Analyzing detected residential burglaries from Brisbane, Australia, we apply a random effects variant of the discrete spatial choice model to estimate preference variation between offenders across six location choice characteristics. Furthermore, in attempting to understand the causes of this variation we estimate how offenders’ spatial target preferences might be affected by where they live and by their age. Results: Findings of this analysis demonstrate that while in the aggregate the characteristics of location choice are consistent with the findings from previous studies, considerable preference variation is found between offenders. Conclusions: This research highlights that current understanding of choice outcomes is relatively poor and that existing applications of the discrete spatial choice approach may underestimate preference variation between offenders.

This chapter considers the psychosocial consequences of becoming a parent across the adolescent decade within contemporary society. This chapter focuses on issues of timing of the advent of parenthood within the course of life the sequence of this transition to parenthood in terms of other expectable adult role changes and the interplay of social timing sequence and motivational factors in the experience of this transition particularly among young women of color living within circumstances characterized by economic privation and social disorganization. This discussion is founded on the concept of a social timetable that places particular individual attainments across the course of life within the context of socially defined entrances and exits from particular roles. (authors)

Latino immigrant presence in urban neighborhoods has been linked with reduced neighborhood cohesion in social disorganization–based ethnic heterogeneity hypotheses and enhanced cohesion in immigration revitalization approaches. Using the 2000–2002 Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey and the 1994–1995 Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods Community Survey, we explore the association between Latino immigrant concentration and both levels of, and agreement about, neighborhood collective efficacy. Findings from multilevel models with heteroskedastic variance indicate that Latino immigrant concentration exhibits a nonlinear association with collective efficacy. At low levels, increases in Latino immigrant concentration diminish collective efficacy, consistent with a heterogeneity hypothesis. The negative association between Latino immigrant concentration and collective efficacy declines in magnitude as immigrant concentration increases and, particularly in LA, becomes positive beyond a threshold, consistent with an immigration revitalization effect. We also find an inverse nonlinear pattern of association with the variance of collective efficacy. At low levels, increasing Latino immigrant concentration increases the variance of collective efficacy (reflecting more disagreement), but beyond a threshold, this association becomes negative (reflecting increasing agreement). This pattern is observed in both LA and Chicago. The prevalence of social interaction and reciprocated exchange within neighborhoods explains a modest proportion of the Latino immigrant concentration effect on mean levels of collective efficacy in Chicago, but does little to explain effects on the mean in LA or effects on the variance in either LA or Chicago. These findings offer insight into the complex role Latino immigrant presence plays in shaping neighborhood social climate.

There are two kinds of theories of criminal victimization: individual (micro) and aggregate/structural (macro) correlates. Victimologists have focused upon the characteristics of victims and victim-precipitated crime. Findings that young, unmarried males had higher rates of victimization than their demographic counterparts led to theories about lifestyles/routine activities. The association between social structures and aggregate victimization rates supported the theory of collective efficacy and clarified the social disorganization theory advanced by Shaw and McKay. Opportunity theory and Blau’s theory of heterogeneity help explain the effects of heterogeneity and residential segregation.

Are racially-motivated hate crimes, non-criminal bias incidents, and general forms of crime associated with the same structural factors? If so, then social disorganization, a powerful structural correlate of general crime, should predict rates of hate incidents. However, tests of social disorganization’s effects on racially-motivated hate crime yield inconsistent results. This study uses data from the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission (PHRC) to explore such inconsistencies. Specifically, we assess the effects of social disorganization across contexts and types of bias motivation using bias incidents over 12 years. The results suggest that (a) social disorganization, particularly residential instability, is robustly correlated with rates of both hate crime and other prejudicial conduct, and that (b) the interactive effects of social disorganization help explain variations in incident rates by motivation type. Specifically, anti-black incidents are most frequent in unstable, homogeneous (i.e. white) a...

Gentrification and other types of neighborhood revitalization strategies have been promoted as viable crime reduction strategies, but empirical assessments of this relationship produced inconsistent results. The mixed results were partly due to a narrow theoretical focus on social disorganization and routine activities, but also because of a limited conceptualization of gentrification. The current study draws on gentrification literature more broadly and incorporates insights from additional criminological theories to provide a more complete understanding of how gentrification is related to neighborhood crime. Specifically, three pathways through which gentrification influences neighborhood crime are identified.

Social disorganization theory argues that racial/ethnic heterogeneity is a key neighborhood characteristic leading to social disorganization and, consequently, higher levels of crime. Heterogeneity’s effect is argued to be a result of its fragmentation of social ties along racial/ethnic lines, which creates racially homophilous social networks with few ties bridging racial/ethnic groups. Most studies of social ties in social disorganization models, however, have examined their quantity and left unaddressed the extent to which ties are within or across different racial groups. This study goes beyond previous studies by examining the effects of both racially homophilous and interracial friendship networks on informal social control. Using multilevel models and data from 66 neighborhoods with approximately 2,300 respondents, we found that heterogeneity actually increased the average percentage of residents with interracial friendship networks, but the percentage of residents with interracial networks decreased the likelihood of informal social control. In contrast, the percentage of residents with White racially homophilous networks increased the likelihood of informal social control. Examining the microcontext of individuals’ networks, however, we found residents with interracial ties reported higher likelihoods of informal social control and that this effect was enhanced in neighborhoods with higher percentages of non-White racially homophilous networks.

Objectives: The main objectives of the study are to estimate the impact of mortgage foreclosures on the location of criminal activity within a blockface. Drawing on routine activity theory, disorder theory, and social disorganization theory, the study explores potential mechanisms that link foreclosures to crime. Methods: To estimate the relationship between foreclosures and localized crime, we use detailed foreclosure and crime data at the blockface level in Chicago and a difference-in-difference estimation strategy. Results: Overall, mortgage foreclosures increase crime on blockfaces. Foreclosures have a larger impact on crime that occurs inside residences than on crime in the street. The impact of foreclosures on crime location varies by crime type (violent, property, and public order crime). Conclusions: The evidence supports the three main theoretical mechanisms that link foreclosure activity to local crime. The investigation of the relationship by crime location suggests that foreclosures change the relative attractiveness of indoor and outdoor locations for crime commission on the blockface.

Purpose A growing literature indicates that legal cynicism at the neighborhood level corresponds with retaliatory homicides and persistent homicide rates, net of controls. However, no study to date has examined: a) how cynicism of police performance might be influenced by specific experiences with and perceptions of the police, and b) whether neighborhood cynicism of police performance is associated with violent crime beyond homicides. Method This study analyzed citizen and neighborhood data from Cincinnati, Ohio in the late 1990s - a social setting that had antagonistic police-community relationships. Results The results revealed that perceived unjust policing was the strongest individual level correlate of cynicism of police services, and that aggregate levels of cynicism predicted both homicides and overall violence above and beyond social disorganization as well as previous levels of violence. Conclusion We speak to the importance of these findings in terms of identifying which police-community factors seemingly have the greatest likelihood to facilitate the association between cynicism and persistent neighborhood violence.