Examining the Impact of Early Childhood School Investments on Neighborhood Crime

This study tested the hypothesis that investments in early childhood schools have short-term crime reducing effects in neighborhoods. Time series data from the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, were analyzed to evaluate the effects of an early childhood school built in the neighborhood of Kendall-Whittier as part of a larger neighborhood revitalization plan, on violent and property crime. Results revealed that after controlling for city-wide crime trends and monthly fluctuations, violent crime declined significantly in Kendall-Whittier. Further analysis indicated that the possible crime-reducing effects of school investments on violent crime spread beyond Kendall-Whittier, and no displacement was found. The results for property crime were mixed. The study demonstrates the use of clustering analysis, a useful tool in neighborhood-level research to identify comparison neighborhoods. The findings shed light on the possibility that investments in early childhood schools can yield results in a shorter term than anticipated, making them a desirable component of urban revitalization.     

Crime Places in Context: An Illustration of the Multilevel Nature of Hot Spot Development

Objectives

The present study provides an illustration of a statistical test of the Brantinghams’ theory about the formation of hotspots and the effects that nodes, paths, and environmental backcloth have on their development.

Methods

We used multilevel Poisson regression analysis to explain variation in the count of incidents at each address. Place-level proximity to nodes and paths was measured by using the Euclidian distance from each location to the closest carry-out liquor store, on-premises drinking establishment, and bus route. The broader environmental backcloth was represented by various census block-group characteristics, including density of commercial land use. A three-way place-level interaction as well as a cross-level interaction involving all four key independent variables were used to estimate the Brantinghams’ concept of the overlay of nodes, paths, and backcloth.

Results

The three-way interaction involving the distance to the closest on-premises liquor establishment, the distance to closest carry-out liquor facility, and the distance to the closest bus route was significantly and negatively related to place-level crime incidents. This three-way interaction had effects which varied across neighborhood contexts, with stronger negative effects on crime occurring in neighborhoods characterized by high levels of commercial density.

Conclusion

This study supported the notion of a multilevel theory of crime places and has implications for more effectively addressing crime. In particular, those places with multiple nodes and paths in their proximal environments and dense commercial land within their broader environments likely need additional crime prevention measures to get the same benefit relative to places with multiple nodes and paths in the proximal environments yet little commercial density within their broader environment.

     

School-Based Violent Victimization in Turkey: An Examination of the Cross-National Generality of Lifestyle-Routine Activities and Self-Control Theories

ABSTRACT

The authors examined victimization among Turkish school students as a function of individual lifestyles and routine activities, perceived school guardianship/control, and low self-control. In doing so, they aimed to provide a much-needed explanatory test of school victimization in Turkey while also offering an important test of the cross-cultural generalizability of self-control and opportunity-based theories of victimization. Logistic regression models of violent victimization were estimated using a subsample of over 900 Turkish school students. Regression coefficients were estimated for 20 datasets generated through a multivariate sequential imputation technique, with results then pooled. Lifestyle measures associated with school-based victimization included in-school delinquency, delinquent self-cutting, gang membership, and number of gang friends. Perceived school guardianship/control was also related to victimization, as was low self-control. The authors found little evidence that the effects of low self-control were mediated or moderated by lifestyle characteristics or perceived school security. Findings suggest that the propositions of lifestyle-routine activities and self-control theories regarding victimization risk can largely be generalized to Turkish high school students. Findings imply that school-based victimization prevention in Turkey should target individual-level criminogenic traits and lifestyles as well as risky environmental school characteristics.