Perceptions Of Social Disorder Research Articles

UNRAVELLING COLLEGE STUDENTS’ FEAR OF CRIME: THE ROLE OF PERCEIVED SOCIAL DISORDER AND PHYSICAL DISORDER ON CAMPUS

ABSTRACT The current study explores the role of individual and environmental determinants on students’ fear of crime. Based on a large-scale survey among students of a Belgian university (n = 1,463), the relationship between perceived social and physical disorder and the three dimensions of fear of crime (perceived risk of victimization, feelings of anxiety, avoidance behaviour) is examined. Support was found for a relationship between perceived social and physical disorder and perceived risk of victimization. Moreover, a relationship was found between students’ perception of social disorder and anxiety and students’ perception of physical disorder and avoidance behaviour. Based on the results, this study suggests that preventing or reducing visible signs of disorder on campus should inevitably be included in the university’s security policy. This research offers universities more insight in the determinants of students’ fear of crime and potential measures to increase their (perception of) safety.

Race and Ethnic Differences in Fear of Property, Personal, and Gang Victimization among People Involved in Crime: Testing the Effects of Perceived Neighborhood Characteristics

ABSTRACTFear of victimization among the general population has received much scholarly attention, yet fear among people involved in crime remains largely overlooked. Among 2,200 criminally active respondents, we examine the differential effects across race/ethnicity of perceived neighborhood characteristics on fear of victimization. Hispanics were significantly more afraid than African Americans and Whites. For Hispanics, perceptions of social disorder and higher levels of collective efficacy significantly predicted fear of property, personal, and gang crime. Physical disorder and subcultural diversity were more salient for African Americans and Whites. We discuss the fear-neighborhood disorganization link among racial subgroups.

What Makes Police Officers Act? Police Response to Instances of Intimate Partner Violence.

Using data from the 2009 General Social Survey (GSS Cycle 23: Victimization main file), this study assessed the relationship between individual and neighborhood-level factors and police response to spousal violence in Canada. A total of 890 participants in the GSS reported experiences of spousal violence within the previous 5 years, with approximately 22% of these victims reporting direct contact with the police because of the violence. Among this subsample of victims who had police contact, we evaluated the extent to which individual-level factors (sociodemographic and violence characteristics) and neighborhood-level factors (perceptions of social disorder and the presence of police facilities in one's community) were related to distinct types of police response to reported spousal violence. Regression analyses suggest variations in police response based on sociodemographic, violence, and neighborhood characteristics; however, overall satisfaction with police actions taken were not found to be significantly different among victims based on these characteristics. Implications are relevant for policing practice as results suggest that different victims may have different safety needs and abilities to communicate these needs to the police.

Perceptions of social disorder in public spaces in a disadvantaged neighborhood: The example of Cologne-Chorweiler

Residents of segregated neighborhoods perceive social disorder in their neighborhoods differently. Starting from the broken-windows theory and the social organization approach, the paper develops a deeper understanding of the role of place for the perception of social disorder. Participant structural observations were conducted, along with a photo survey and collection of ethnographic data about six locations within the studied neighborhood. Comparison of perceptions of the locations and social practices within them shows that social disorder is perceived not by residents who live directly at the location, but by others. This pattern is independent of the type and intensity of social disorder observed.

The Influence of Women's Neighborhood Resources on Perceptions of Social Disorder.

Research links neighborhood social disorder with poorer health. But factors beyond observed disorder may influence perceptions that social disorder is problematic. This study investigates whether women's aggregate socioeconomic resources relative to men's in the broader neighborhood context attenuate the extent to which more prevalent observed social disorder within the immediate residential neighborhood contributes to perceptions of more problematic social disorder. This attenuation likely is pronounced among women, for whom sexual harassment in public spaces is a more salient concern compared to men. Using data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods, multilevel models analyze individual perceptions of problematic social disorder (N=3,107) regressed on the interactive effect of observed social disorder within the census block group (N=525) and women's relative resources within the neighborhood cluster (N=80). The results show that women's relative resources within the broader neighborhood context protect against women's perceptions that typically undesirable neighborhood conditions are problematic.

A New Look into Broken Windows: What Shapes Individuals’ Perceptions of Social Disorder?

PurposeThis study compares perceptual and observational measures of social disorder to examine the influence of observable levels of disorder in shaping residents’ perceptions of social problems on their street. MethodsThis study uses regression models utilizing data from a survey of residents, systematic social observations and police calls for service to explore the formation of perceptions of social disorder. ResultsWe find little correspondence between residents’ perceptual and researchers’ observational measures of social disorder, suggesting that residents form perceptions of social disorder differently than do outsiders to their community. However, researchers’ observations of physical disorder were found to strongly influence residents’ perceptions of social disorder. Findings also suggest that people with different demographic backgrounds and life experiences may perceive the same social environment in very different ways. ConclusionsThe results add to a growing literature suggesting that social disorder is a social construct, rather than a concrete phenomenon. Moreover, we suggest that the linkage between physical disorder and residents’ perceptions of social disorder might provide an avenue for police to address residents’ fear of crime while avoiding some of the criticisms that have been leveled against programs targeting social disorder.

Taking place and space seriously: reflections on ‘Disparity and Diversity in the Contemporary City’

Rob Sampson’s “Disparity and Diversity in the Contemporary City” establishes two very critical points for sociologists generally, and for scholars of the city in particular. First and foremost, it highlights the importance of individual perception, a form of cognitive processing, as a key determinant in social outcomes. While not entirely new, this claim is in need of serious re-consideration and further discussion in sociology today. Second and most innovatively, if not importantly, Sampson introduces a concern with perception into studies of the city and applies it to the phenomenon of segregation, both income and race-based. By so doing, he extends the role of perception and cognition beyond the domain of subjective urban experience, a subarea of study already well-developed in the work of the urban sociologist Claude Fischer. Sampson argues provocatively that perceptions of social disorder are central to the reproduction of neighborhood composition and urban socio-spatial form. Above and beyond his fascinating findings about the race-linked interpretive biases that drive individuals to perceive greater social disorder in certain neighborhoods than actual empirical evidence would dictate, Sampson’s research will bring the discipline of urban sociology more in line with recent innovations in brain and cognitive science that are changing the way many established fields are coming to understand individual thought and behavior.

Disadvantage, disorder and diversity

Disadvantage, disorder and diversity

An Application of “Broken‐Windows” and Related Theories to the Study of Disorder, Fear, and Collective Efficacy in Schools

This article considers school climate and perceptions of social disorder. When a school is characterized by disorder or physical risk, basic educational goals and processes are jeopardized. We use survey data from 33 public schools serving grades 6–8 in a large mid‐Atlantic city to examine relationships among physical disorder (e.g., broken windows and poor building conditions), fear, collective efficacy, and social disorder. Path analyses reveal a direct association between physical disorder and social disorder even when prior levels of collective efficacy are controlled—a finding consistent with traditional broken‐windows theories. Further, there is evidence that the effects of physical disorder may be operating through increased fear and decreased collective efficacy to affect perceptions of threatening or violent interactions among people.

Media, communication and the establishment of public camera surveillance programmes in Canada

Throughout Europe and North America, policing services, government agencies and private-sector interests have turned increasingly to open-street closed-circuit television (CCTV) surveillance to address crime, fear of crime and perceptions of social disorder. Although recent scholarly contributions have displaced the traditional explanatory reliance on the panopticon with mechanisms of consumer seduction, ‘post-panoptic’ insights into the establishment of open-street monitoring programmes have not advanced completely beyond the determinism reminiscent of the exercise of panoptical power. With the intention of supplementing the displacement of the panoptic paradigm with a less deterministic and more flexible framework, we conceptualize the establishment of public monitoring programmes in terms of the central role of communications and media in surveillance policy development and change. Presenting empirical data from an investigation of public camera surveillance in Canada, we develop theoretical and, necessarily, empirical insights that enable us to move beyond explanatory emphases on responsibilization strategies and social ordering techniques.