Effect of Physical and Social Factors on Residents' Sense of Security in Multi-Family Housing Developments and Design for Living - The Residents' View of Multi-Family Housing (A Methodological Review) (From Link Between Crime and the Built Environment, Volume 2, P C245-C250, 1980, by Tetsuro Motoyam

• NCJ Number: 79561
• Author(s): T Motoyama; H Rubenstein; P Hartjens
• Date Published: 1980
• Length: 6 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 Franklin Becker's study of residents of multifamily housing developments and their perceptions of factors affecting their sense of security; it focuses on the impact of physical design factors on such perceptions.

Abstract

The study consisted of interviews with persons in 357 randomly selected apartments in multifamily housing in New York State. In addition to data collected from the 591 respondents, information was also derived from about 100 observation periods in which people, activities, and places were systematically mapped. The research was conducted in three types of high-rise and different types of low-rise apartments. The study is exploratory (preexperimental) and 'emergent,' since the hypotheses were derived from the data itself. The independent variables were apartment type, location of apartment complex, physical design factors, number of acquaintances in housing development, degree of friendship and trust among neighbors, and presence of security guards. The study concluded that (1) the residents more often attributed a sense of security to the presence of guards than to physical design factors as such; (2) design factors can influence guards' effectiveness; and (3) having 20 or more persons to whom one said 'hello' did not correlate significantly with a resident's sense of security, although the number of 'good friends' living in the development did correlate significantly with a sense of security. Generally, these conclusions appear overdrawn, since the research design confounded guards and design factors. In order to support the conclusion, the research would have to include a factorial design with two factors--the presence of guards and housing design. The conclusion that design factors can influence guards' effectiveness is an interpretation of nonquantitative data. The research that supports the conclusion that the number of friends living in the complex increases a resident's sense of security is not described.