Victim's Experience and Fear of Crime: A Contribution to the Victimization Perspective (From Advances in Psychology and Law, P 107-126, 1997, Santiago Redondo and Vicente Garrido, et al., eds. -- See NCJ-175532)

• NCJ Number: 175534
• Author(s): H Kury
• Date Published: 1997
• Length: 20 pages
• Sale Source: Walter de Gruyter & Co
• Language: English
• Country: Germany (Unified)

Annotation

This paper reports on a study that examined the relationship between a person's experience of criminal victimization and his/her fear of crime.

Abstract

On the basis of previous relevant research, this study hypothesized that victims of criminality have more fear of crime than non-victims, although the differences are sure to be moderate. Specifically, victims of serious crimes have more fear of crime than victims of less serious crimes. Further, victims who have had multiple victimizations have more fear of crime than those who were victimized only once. These differences remain after controlling for such intervening variables as sex, age, level of urbanization, and income. This hypothesis was tested on a variety of data sets. Data were obtained from the International Crime Survey (ICS) for 1989 and 1992. Relevant questions in these surveys related to reluctance to go certain places at night and an estimate of the probability of having one's home burglarized. Data were also obtained from two German victimization studies. In spite of the still-open issues of this preliminary statistical analysis that suffers from low case numbers, the author concludes from the findings that victim groups are not homogeneous, but rather significantly different. With respect to fear of crime, the victims, on the one hand, clearly differentiate as expected according to sex and age. On the other hand, the findings also show that involvement in crimes and antisocial, criminogenic surroundings, apart from sex and age factors, reduces the fear of being victimized. Those who consciously frequent locations and situations that carry a high risk of victimization tend to prepare themselves in various ways to combat or prevent their victimization. This tends to reduce fear of crime. Even though such persons may become crime victims, the victimization does not invoke the degree of fear of crime that characterizes persons who do not believe that they have sufficient defenses against victimization. On the whole, the author concludes that the study hypothesis is confirmed. 4 tables and 35 references