The Psychology of Fear of Crime. Conceptual and Methodological Perspectives

Abstract

Since the very beginnings of research on the fear of crime in the early 1970s, authors have emphasized the need for theoretical clarification of the meaning and measurement of the concept. The present article outlines a theory of fear of crime from the psychological perspective. In particular, psychological concepts of emotions, most notably the state/trait distinction and the notion of emotions as involving multiple components, are applied to fear of crime. The outcome of this conceptual clarification is a two-dimensional taxonomy which can be used to differentiate between instruments applied to assess fear of crime. .inally, taking into account the results of psychological research on survey methodology, the practical value of this taxonomy for the assessment of fear of crime is discussed.Over the past three decades, fear of crime has been a recurrent theme in public policy and academic debate. The discussion has frequently been prompted by empirical research on fear of crime; the body of literature has grown substantially in recent years (see Hale 1996, for a review), and only lately has a collection of classic articles on fear of crime been published (Ditton and .arrall 2000). Although the results of so-called crime surveys suggest that fear of crime is a prevalent social problem, the need for a theoretical clarification of the meaning and measurement of fear of crime has been emphasized repeatedly (e.g. .arrall et al. 1997;Taylor and Hale 1986;Thompson et al. 1992). The perspective taken here is based on the hypothesis that previous interpretations of empirical results lack the theoretical background necessary for sensitive conclusions to be drawn. In other words, we argue that empirical data on fear of crime are often seen through the wrong spectacles.While the investigation of fear of crime has a long tradition in criminology, the investigation of fear has an even longer tradition in psychology. The purpose of this paper is to render the findings of psychological research usable for work on fear of crime. Accordingly, psychological concepts of emotions, notably the state/trait distinction and the notion of emotions as involving multiple components, will be applied to fear of crime, thus providing the outlines of a psychological conception of fear of crime.Our discussion proceeds in two major steps. In the first step, we investigate the conceptual structure of fear of crime. We start by focusing on the conceptual and empirical links between the fear of crime as a state on the one hand, and as a disposition on the other. Recent psychological approaches consider emotions to be affective states characterized by responses that include physiological, behavioural-expressive and subjective facets. The state of fear of crime will thus be assumed to be multidimensional, 600

Crime, fear of crime and mental health: synthesis of theory and systematic reviews of interventions and qualitative evidence

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Examining context-specific perceptions of risk: exploring the utility of “human-in-the-loop” simulation models for criminology

“…Gabriel and Greve (2003) suggested this perception of risk consists of three elements: (1) an individual's cognitive awareness of threat, (2)a subsequent affective experience arising from the cognition, and (3)an appropriate behavior, consistent with the underlying motive or action tendency. According to this three-stage process, the presence of the first and second components could be logically inferred from the observation of the third: that is, behaving in a manner that reduces risk of victimization is consistent with a perception of risk and an associated concern of victimization.…”

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And My Mama Said

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