NCJ Number
180446
Journal
Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology Volume: 32 Issue: 1 Dated: April 1999 Pages: 1-15
Date Published
April 1999
Length
15 pages
Annotation
A predominantly qualitative study used 65 individual interviews and focus groups with a total of 83 participants to gather information on fear of crime among a group of Australians.
Abstract
The study took place in mid-1997. The interviewer asked standard fixed-choice quantitative items used in other research and then immediately asked participants to explain why they gave certain responses. The research took place in four sites in New South Wales and Tasmania. Participants identified particular spatial and temporal dimensions of crime and projected their fear on social groups and individuals. Results revealed that feelings of fear are dynamic and contextual. They are constantly subject to reassessment of change depending on factors such as the time of day or night, individuals' past experiences of crime, their familiarity and experience with an area, the presence or absence of others in a particular location at a particular time, and circuits of localized knowledge. Feelings of uncertainty and loss of control were central to the identification of dangerous places and dangerous others. The participants' fear tended to be in relation to the figure of the unpredictable stranger. This person was an individual who did not share the participant's own approach to life or the participant's principles and sensibilities. Table and 20 references (Author abstract modified)