Convenience Stores, Armed Robbery, and Physical Environmental Features (A Methodological Review) (From Link Between Crime and the Built Environment, Volume 2, P C343-C350, 1980, by Tetsuro Motoyama et al - See NCJ-79544)

• NCJ Number: 79572
• Author(s): T Motoyama; H Rubenstein; P Hartjens
• Date Published: 1980
• Length: 8 pages
• Corporate Author: American Institutes for Research
• Sale Source: National Institute of Justice/
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America
• Note: Available on microfiche from NCJRS as NCJ-79544.

Annotation

This review assesses Dennis Duffala's investigation of whether convenience stores' vulnerability to armed robberies is associated with certain environmental characteristics.

Abstract

The environmental characteristics examined included the proximity of the store to major transportation routes, the location of the store on a street with light vehicular traffic, the location of the store in a residential or vacant land use area, and the location of the store in an area with few surrounding commercial activities. Robbery information on the 39 stores selected for study was obtained from police and sheriff records. Through onsite inspections, the four environmental variables were measured and recorded. The hypothesized relationships between the environmental variables and vulnerability to crime were then tested separately with 2x2 chi-square analysis. A store's proximity to major transportation routes or its location in residential and vacant land use areas did not seem to affect armed robbery rates significantly. On the other hand, the amount of traffic in front of a store and the number of surrounding commercial activities did exhibit a statistically significant influence on the crime rate. The 4 hypotheses were all deemed highly significant in explaining that 12 of the convenience stores were robbed 3 times or more. The review of the study, however, suggests that the significance of 'surrounding commercial activities' found after converting the dependent variable may be due to the two zero entries in the 3x3 table, rather than confirming the hypothesis. The correct null hypothesis is that no relationship exists. The significance of the independent variables when viewed in interaction with each other is not supported by the study. The study did not test the four independent variables and the dependent variable simultaneously. For the original report, see NCJ 76069.