NCJ Number
190821
Journal
Social Problems Volume: 48 Issue: 3 Dated: August 2001 Pages: 322-340
Date Published
August 2001
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This study examined the relationship between perceived racial and ethnic composition of a neighborhood and the existence of a criminal threat, which was operationalized as the perceived risk of criminal victimization.
Abstract
The study involved interviews with a statewide random sample of 3,000 Florida residents conducted in the fall of 1996. This was the first assessment of this issue to include Hispanics -- the largest and fastest growing minority in the State -- as both respondents and as ethnic "others" whose presence may be a source of perceived risk for some. For the full sample, OLS regressions showed that perceived risk of victimization was influenced by the perception that either Hispanics or Blacks lived nearby. The effects of the perception that Hispanics lived nearby were consistently stronger than those associated with the perceived proximity of Blacks. Analyses for subsamples showed that whites were threatened by Hispanics and Blacks, but only in South Florida, where they were slightly outnumbered by those two groups. Hispanics were also threatened by the presence of Blacks and other Hispanics, but only outside of South Florida, where they were greatly outnumbered by Blacks and whites. The study results supported a core assumption of the "social threat" perspective, which presumes the mobilization of social control was influenced by the perception of criminal threat associated with the perceived proximity of racial others. These results also suggested that crime threat may be "ethnicity coded" as well as "race coded" and may, in certain contexts, have more effect on those who were in a minority status than on the dominant majority. 4 tables, 1 figure, and 57 references