CRIME AND PLACE 2: CRIME ATTRACTORS AND CRIME GENERATORS Chair: Marre Lammers Chair: Marre Lammers

0124 - WHERE BROKEN WINDOWS SHOULD BE FIXED: TOWARDS IDENTIFICATION OF AREAS AT THE TIPPING POINT

Wouter Steenbeek (Netherlands)¹; Christian Kreis (Switzerland)²

1 - NSCR (Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement); 2 - Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine at the University of Bern

Introducing their Broken Windows thesis, Wilson and Kelling (1982) recommended that police focus their limited resources to stabilize the ‘areas at the tipping point’ rather than crime-ridden areas: “The key is to identify neighbourhoods at the tipping point—where the public order is deteriorating but not unreclaimable, where the streets are used frequently but by apprehensive people, where a window is likely to be broken at any time, and must quickly be

fixed if all are not to be shattered”. Unfortunately, previous studies have all too often focused on the effects of order maintenance policing in disorder ‘hot spots’. Thus, we argue that the problem of identifying the marginally threatened areas is still current today.

The objective of this study is to introduce a systematic method to identify areas with similar levels of disorder (from serene, to ‘tipping’, to crime-ridden) which is crucial for a valid empirical test of Broken Windows Theory (BWT). Systematic Social Observation data are used of almost 2000 locations in the city of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Spatially-constrained hierarchical agglomerative clustering is used to aggregate individual observation locations to form homogeneous areas. Davies-Bouldin Index and Intraclass Correlation Coefficient are used to objectively identify the optimum number of clusters.

The results show that newly identified areas differ from administrative neighbourhoods as well as from hot spots of disorder. The regionalization method provides a tentative solution to both the ‘zonation’ and ‘aggregation’ problem of the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem liable to affect empirical studies of BWT. Hot spot analysis fails to identify areas with moderate levels of disorder, which impedes testing the basic precept of BWT. Our results may partly explain why the evidence on the effectiveness of order maintenance policing remains inconclusive. We suggest that randomized controlled trials of order maintenance policing should be performed on these new areas rather than in hot spots of disorder.

0125 - OPEN FOR BUSINESS: THE IMPACT OF OPENING HOURS ON STREET SEGMENT CRIME LEVELS

Stijn Ruiter (Netherlands)¹; Wouter Steenbeek (Netherlands)² 1 - NSCR / Utrecht University; 2 - NSCR

Crime levels vary considerably from one street segment to the next. Although many different types of businesses have been shown to act as crime generators or attractors, most studies only focused on how they affect the spatial patterning of crime and entirely ignored temporal variation. However, why would a business attract crime when it is closed? We combine police crime data for the year 2009 from the city of The Hague, Netherlands, with data on all local businesses and their opening hours to assess how the opening hours of businesses affect cyclical crime rhythms. All crimes (N=49,013) are geocoded to the street segment level (N=14,375) and we analyze street segment crimes by 2-hour intervals by day of the week. We employ fixed effects models to rigorously test how opening hours affect street segment crime controlling for time-stable (un)measured heterogeneity.

109 0126 - THE INFLUENCE OF CRIMINOGENIC SETTINGS ON ADOLESCENT DELINQUENCY:

PARENTING AS A PROTECTIVE FACTOR?

Heleen Janssen (Netherlands)¹; Veroni Eichelsheim (Netherlands)¹; Frank Weerman (Netherlands)¹; Gerben Bruinsma (Netherlands)¹

1 - NSCR

Previous studies have shown that spending time hanging around in criminogenic settings is related to adolescent’s delinquent behaviour. However, not all adolescents who spend time in criminogenic settings engage in delinquent activities. A large body of research has demonstrated that parenting plays an important role in adolescent delinquent behaviour.

Recent studies have furthermore shown that parents can act as ‘access barriers’ by restricting the amount of time adolescents spend in criminogenic settings.

The aim of the present study is to examine whether parenting can act as a protective factor against the influence of criminogenic settings on involvement in delinquent behaviour. In other words: does the quality of parenting behaviour explain why adolescents, who spend time in criminogenic settings, do not engage in delinquent activities? The present study builds on previous studies by examining the extent to which parents are able to counteract (or promote) the negative influences of criminogenic settings.

As during adolescence the amount of time spent away from home and away from the residential neighbourhood increases, we do not only focus on the possible influence of the residential neighbourhood on involvement in delinquency, but also on the potential influence of the locations outside the residential neighbourhoods were adolescents spend their time.

Longitudinal data of the Study of Peers, Activities and Neighbourhoods (SPAN) were used, which included space time budget data capturing in great detail where exactly (up to 200 meters) the adolescents spent their time, what they were doing and with whom. We enriched these space-time budget data with systematic social observation data about the level of disorder of the locations where adolescents spent their time.

As a result, we were able to examine whether parenting has a possible protective effect against the influences from the residential environment, but also whether parenting has a possible protective effect against the influences of the locations where adolescent spent their time hanging around with peers. We examined the possible protective effects of multiple parenting dimensions: parental monitoring, parental limit setting and the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship.

0127 - A STUDY OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CRIME AND URBAN VEGETATION IN A PORTUGUESE CITY

Nuno Alvim (Portugal)¹; Maria Francisca Rebocho (Portugal)¹ 1 - University Fernando Pessoa

The empirical relationship between urban vegetation and criminality is one fraught with controversy, and lacking in scientific consensus. Literature reviews show the existence of two divergent paradigms of thought. Traditionally, vegetation is seen as a criminogenic element, thought to facilitate crime by allowing the potential criminal to conceal himself from the victim´s sight and thus remain inconspicuous. This has spawned historical attempts of controlling or reducing the vegetation in order to prevent crime. However, more recently, urban vegetation has also been thought to have potential in crime prevention, according to several studies conducted in the United States. In line with these studies, this study aims at finding a connection between crime and urban vegetation in the Portuguese urban context.

Theoretical models drawn from environmental criminology, such as rational choice theory, routine activity theory, and broken windows, as well as from environmental psychology, such as attention restoration theory are instrumental in the understanding of the founding basis for this study, and are discussed and framed into context. A review of current literature linking crime to vegetation will be presented and briefly analyzed. From this discussion emerges the hypothesis that vegetation contributes to crime reduction through two different mechanisms, the mitigation of psychological precursors of violence, and the informal surveillance stimuli.

Employing a Geographic Information System (GIS), vegetation indexes produced by orbital remote detection will be contrasted with geo-referenced criminality rates in the corresponding urban regions, while statistically controlling for socio-demographic variables. Results will be presented and discussed, as will their implications for policy, crime prevention strategies and policing.

2.10 GENDER, CRIME AND JUSTICE WORKING GROUP: PANEL 2: YOUNG WOMEN