Are Older People Most Afraid of Crime? Reconsidering Age Differences in Fear of Victimization

Ferraro, Kenneth F.; LaGrange, Randy

doi:10.1093/geronj/47.5.s233

Cited by 134 publications

(72 citation statements)

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“…Females felt less in control than males and judged the consequences to be higher; they judged likelihood to be higher and felt that their own social group was more likely to fall victim than other social groups. This study also found that younger people worried more frequently than older people about personal crime (but not about property crime) -a finding consistent with the studies of Akers, La Greca, Sellers, and Cochran (1987), Chadee and Ditton (2003), Ferraro and LaGrange (1992), LaGrange and Ferraro (1989) and Ziegler and Mitchell (2003) -but contrary to gender, these differences could not be explained by differential vulnerability or likelihoodperception. And further investigation -which differentiated between personal and property crime -showed that females worried more frequently than males about personal crime, but that there was no gender difference in worry about property crime.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 88%

A psychological perspective on vulnerability in the fear of crime

Jackson¹

2009

Psychology, Crime & Law

251

247

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This document is the author's final manuscript accepted version of the journal article, incorporating any revisions agreed during the peer review process. Some differences between this version and the published version may remain. You are advised to consult the publisher's version if you wish to cite from it. AbstractThis paper examines vulnerability and risk perception in the fear of crime. Past studies have often treated gender and age as proxies for vulnerability, and on the few occasions that vulnerability has been operationalised, there has been little agreement on the mechanisms that underpin perceived susceptibility. To develop a more theoretically-driven approach, the current study examines whether markers of vulnerability are associated with higher levels of fear through mediating assessments of likelihood, control and consequence. Females are found to worry more frequently than males partly because (a) they feel less able to physically defend themselves, (b) they have lower perceived self-efficacy, (c) they have higher perceived negative impact, and (d) they see the likelihood of victimisation as higher for themselves and for their social group. Younger people are also found to worry more frequently than older people, but differential vulnerability does not explain this association. Finally structural equation modelling shows that the effects on worry of physical defence capabilities, selfefficacy and perceived consequence are mostly mediated through judgements of absolute and relative risk. Conclusions focus on the implications of this finding for debates about the rationality of the fear of crime.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 88%

A psychological perspective on vulnerability in the fear of crime

Jackson¹

2009

Psychology, Crime & Law

251

247

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“…Older adults do, however, provide larger rewards to people who have invested in them, reflecting a heightened trustworthiness. Studies have also shown that older adults are actually less afraid of being victimized, despite their greater vulnerability to many kinds of crime (32).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural and behavioral bases of age differences in perceptions of trust

Castle

Eisenberger²,

Seeman

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

194

213

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Older adults are disproportionately vulnerable to fraud, and federal agencies have speculated that excessive trust explains their greater vulnerability. Two studies, one behavioral and one using neuroimaging methodology, identified age differences in trust and their neural underpinnings. Older and younger adults rated faces high in trust cues similarly, but older adults perceived faces with cues to untrustworthiness to be significantly more trustworthy and approachable than younger adults. This age-related pattern was mirrored in neural activation to cues of trustworthiness. Whereas younger adults showed greater anterior insula activation to untrustworthy versus trustworthy faces, older adults showed muted activation of the anterior insula to untrustworthy faces. The insula has been shown to support interoceptive awareness that forms the basis of "gut feelings," which represent expected risk and predict risk-avoidant behavior. Thus, a diminished "gut" response to cues of untrustworthiness may partially underlie older adults' vulnerability to fraud. (1) and the Federal Trade Commission (2) have conjectured that older adults' excessive positive responses to other people may underlie their vulnerability. Consistent with this idea, a large body of literature indicates that older adults shape their experiences and social networks in ways that lead to positive socioemotional outcomes (3). As such, older adults' judgments of the trustworthiness of others may also be skewed in a positive direction. Affective judgments of trustworthiness implicate processing in limbic regions, including the amygdala and insula (4, 5). Accordingly, age differences in trust may be reflected in altered patterns of activation in these neural regions.We report the results of two investigations that address how older adults process facial cues indicative of trust differently from younger adults. The first is a behavioral study in which participants rated faces that varied in cues conveying trustworthiness (trustworthy, neutral, untrustworthy) (4). The second study used functional neuroimaging to identify whether facial cues of trustworthiness are processed differently in the brains of older vs. younger adults. We predicted that older adults would perceive people to be more trustworthy and that this pattern would be reflected in lesser insula and/or amygdala responses to the stimuli. Study 1People make many inferences about personal attributes from facial features (6, 7). One fundamental such judgment is whether a person is inherently trustworthy or not (5,8). The present study investigated whether there are reliable age differences in how older and younger adults infer trust from facial cues.Results. Older and younger adults observed faces that had previously been selected to convey cues regarding trustworthiness (trustworthy, neutral, or untrustworthy) (4) and rated them on how trustworthy and approachable the person seemed to be. These ratings were subjected to Age group (younger vs. older) by Face Type (trustworthy, neutral, untrustworthy)...

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“…This is consistent with Seccombe and Ishii-Kuntz's (1991) finding that for all cohorts age 55 or older, fear of crime was the most serious problem. Many studies have found that fear of crime is a serious stressor for older adults; however, the actual crime rate is less for older persons than for younger persons (see Ferraro & LaGrange, 1992, for a review). This "victimization/fear paradox" (Ferraro & LaGrange, 1992) emphasizes the traumatic impact of crime on older adults and may explain our result.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Events as Correlates of Burden in Spouse Caregivers of Persons with Alzheimer's Disease

Russo

Vitaliano

1995

Experimental Aging Research

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The first goal of this study was to examine the occurrence and appraised distress of 20 stressful life events in 175 spouse caregivers (mean age = 68.6) of persons with Alzheimer's disease and 92 age- and gender-matched controls (mean age = 68.5). The second goal was to determine whether, in the caregivers, life stressors were related to burden after controlling for caregiver age, gender, satisfaction with social supports, and care-recipient cognitive and activities of daily living functioning. Caregivers and controls had similar occurrences and appraisals for all but 3 events, which occurred more frequently in caregivers (i.e., "changes in your spouse's health," "changes in your relationship with your spouse," and "changes in the way you friends and family treat you (social relations)"). Only "changes in finances" was appraised as more distressing by caregivers. Six events explained burden in the regressions: "victim of crime," "age discrimination," "serious family arguments (not including spouse)," "change in caregiver's health," "trouble with Medicaid/Medicare or Social Security," and "move to retirement home (associated with less burden)." Age discrimination was related to burden only for the caregivers of the most impaired care recipients. Also, caregivers who experienced health problems and who had been victims of crimes were the most burdened. Caregivers are not immune to problems experienced by older adults, and these problems may exacerbate caregiver burden. Clinicians should consider the overall context of a caregiver's life when evaluating burden.

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Are Older People Most Afraid of Crime? Reconsidering Age Differences in Fear of Victimization

Cited by 134 publications

References 0 publications

A psychological perspective on vulnerability in the fear of crime

A psychological perspective on vulnerability in the fear of crime

Neural and behavioral bases of age differences in perceptions of trust

Life Events as Correlates of Burden in Spouse Caregivers of Persons with Alzheimer's Disease

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