Using a South Korean sample from 2010 National Crime Victim Survey, the current research examined the gender differences of fear of four different types of crime testing the shadow of sexual assault thesis, which asserts that sexual assault operates as a master offense for females. The current study provides insight into the robustness of the shadow hypothesis by controlling for various covariates (e.g., perceptions of the neighborhood and crime-related media consumption) that have been often omitted in this line of literature. Results show that the largest difference in fear between males and females was the fear of sexual assault, and based on coefficient comparison tests, fear of sexual assault was a stronger predictor of fear of other crimes among males than among females. The current study calls for future research to disentangle the shadow of sexual hypothesis in different settings and to conduct more studies specifically on men’s fear of crime.
This study explores the potential links between crime-related media consumption and confidence in the police based on instrumental and expressive models. Drawing on data from a large sample of South Koreans, direct and indirect effects of crime-related media consumption on perceptions of the police are examined using regression-based multiple mediation analysis. Results showed that although there is no direct effect of media consumption on confidence in the police, crime-related media consumption is significantly and negatively associated with public confidence in the police via perceived incivilities and fear of crime. This study suggests that the police should make a constant effort to develop strategies to enhance communication with the public.
As the number of immigrants in the United States grows, the importance of their confidence in the police cannot be understated. This article simultaneously examines the impact of both generational and ethnic differences among immigrants on their confidence in the police. Using a sample of U.S. residents from the World Value Survey (Wave 6, N = 2,232), the results suggest that first-generation immigrants have less confidence in the police than both nonimmigrants and second-generation immigrants. The results also suggest a generational and ethnic effect with second-generation immigrants of Hispanic/Latino origin reporting a lower level of confidence in the police than other ethnic immigrant groups. The importance of these findings is discussed in light of both scholarly and policy implications.
The purpose of this study is to explore an alternative approach to unravel how both self-control and peer influence relate to offending. Deriving from a dual-systems framework, this study hypothesizes that individuals with varying levels of self-control will be differentially susceptible to the effects of both exposure to deviant peers and informal socializing with peers. Analyses are based on a sample of serious youthful offenders from the Pathways to Desistance Study. The results indicate that exposure to deviant peers has a stronger impact on offending for individuals with higher self-control, consistent with the hypothesis. However, individuals with higher self-control are more vulnerable to unstructured and unsupervised socializing with peers than those lower in self-control, which counters the hypothesis.
Recent experiments have shown that deterrence communication can lead individuals to update their sanction perceptions. However, there remains the question of whether different forms of deterrence communication influence sanction perception updating for illegal marijuana dealing. Using data from an experiment with a nationwide sample of 498 adults, we examined whether a message unpacking sanction risk leads to sanction perception updating and whether this updated risk perception influences drug dealing intentions. The findings revealed that the unpacking message did not influence perceived certainty and severity and intentions to offend, and the risk perceptions did not mediate the impact of the unpacking message on intentions to offend. The implications of the findings are discussed.
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