A profile of the citizen crime prevention activist

By comparing a sample of Neighborhood Watch leaders with a sample of nonparticipants from the same small town/rural areas in the United States, this study developed a profile of the crime prevention activist. Activists were found more likely than nonactivists to be older, white, married, and higher in socioeconomic status, but there were no differences between the groups in terms of sex ratio and employment status. Activists also tended to have more voluntary association memberships, which bind them to their communities. While they were found not to differ significantly from nonactivists in regard to their experience with, fear of, and individual reaction to crime, they were found more likely to perceive crime as increasing, the source of the crime threat as outside their neighborhoods, and police performance as good. Based on these differences, it was concluded that activists perceived crime more as an abstract potential threat by outsiders than as a reality, and that their deterrence activities did not involve any special motivation that differed from other neighborhood efforts to preserve neighborhood stability and solidarity.