Criminology 53(3)

Criminology, August 2015, Volume 53, Issue 3

Biting Once, Twice: The Influence Of Prior On Subsequent Crime Location Choice
Marre Lammers, Barbara Menting, Stijn Ruiter And Wim Bernasco

Properties, victims, and locations previously targeted by offenders have an increased risk of being targeted again within a short time period. It has been suggested that often the same offenders are involved in these repeated events and, thus, that offenders’ prior crime location choices influence their subsequent crime location choices. This article examines repeated crime location choices, testing the hypothesis that offenders are more likely to commit a crime in an area they previously targeted than in areas they did not target before. Unique data from four different data sources are used to study the crime location choices of 3,666 offenders who committed 12,639 offenses. The results indicate that prior crime locations strongly influence subsequent crime location choices. The effects of prior crime locations are larger if the crimes are frequent, if they are recent, if they are nearby, and if they are the same type of crime.

Intimate Partner Violence In Young Adulthood: Narratives Of Persistence And Desistance
Peggy C. Giordano, Wendi L. Johnson, Wendy D. Manning, Monica A. Longmore And Mallory D. Minter

Prior research on patterns of intimate partner violence (IPV) has documented changes over time, but few studies have focused directly on IPV desistance processes. This analysis identifies unique features of IPV, providing a rationale for the focus on this form of behavior cessation. We develop a life-course perspective on social learning as a conceptual framework and draw on qualitative interviews (n = 89) elicited from a sample of young adults who participated in a larger longitudinal study (Toledo Adolescent Relationships Study). The respondents’ backgrounds reflected a range of persistence and desistance from IPV perpetration. Our analyses revealed that relationship-based motivations and changes were central features of the narratives of successful desisters, whether articulated as a stand-alone theme or in tandem with other potential “hooks” for change. The analysis provides a counterpoint to individualistic views of desistance processes, highlighting ways in which social experiences foster attitude shifts and associated behavioral changes that respondents tied to this type of behavior change. The analyses of persisters and those for whom change seemed to be a work in progress provide points of contrast and highlight barriers that limit a respondent's desistance potential. We describe implications for theories of desistance as well as for IPV prevention and intervention efforts.

Delinquency And Gender Moderation In The Moving To Opportunity Intervention: The Role Of Extended Neighborhoods
Corina Graif

A long history of research has indicated that neighborhood poverty increases youth's risk taking and delinquency. This literature predominantly has treated neighborhoods as independent of their surroundings despite rapidly growing ecological evidence on the geographic clustering of crime that suggests otherwise. This study proposes that to understand neighborhood effects, investigating youth's wider surroundings holds theoretical and empirical value. By revisiting longitudinal data on more than 1500 low-income youth who participated in the Moving to Opportunity (MTO) randomized intervention, this article explores the importance of extended neighborhoods (neighborhoods and surroundings) and different concentrated disadvantage configurations in shaping gender differences in risk taking and delinquency. The results from two-stage, least-squares analyses suggest that the extended neighborhoods matter and they matter differently by gender. Among girls, extended neighborhoods without concentrated disadvantage were associated with lower risk-taking prevalence than extended neighborhoods with concentrated disadvantage. In contrast, among boys, localized concentration of disadvantage was associated with the highest prevalence of risk taking and delinquency. Interactions between the immediate and surrounding neighborhoods were similarly associated with differential opportunity and social disorganization mediators. Among the more critical potential mediators of the link between localized disadvantage and boys’ risk taking were delinquent network ties, strain, and perceived absence of legitimate opportunities for success.

Close-Ups And The Scale Of Ecology: Land Uses And The Geography Of Social Context And Crime
Adam Boessen And John R. Hipp

Whereas one line of recent neighborhood research has placed an emphasis on zooming into smaller units of analysis such as street blocks, another line of research has suggested that even the meso-area of neighborhoods is too narrow and that the area surrounding the neighborhood is also important. Thus, there is a need to examine the scale at which the social ecology impacts crime. We use data from seven cities from around the year 2000 to test our research questions using multilevel negative binomial regression models (N = 73,010 blocks and 8,231 block groups). Our results suggest that although many neighborhood factors seem to operate on the microscale of blocks, others seem to have a much broader impact. In addition, we find that racially and ethnically homogenous blocks within heterogeneous block groups have the most crime. Our findings also show the strongest results for a multitude of land-use measures and that these measures sharpen some of the associations from social characteristics. Thus, we find that accounting for multiple scales simultaneously is important in ecological studies of crime.

Intimate Partner Violence Risk Among Victims Of Youth Violence: Are Early Unions Bad, Beneficial, Or Benign?
Danielle C. Kuhl, David F. Warner And Tara D. Warner

Youth violent victimization (YVV) is a risk factor for precocious exits from adolescence via early coresidential union formation. It remains unclear, however, whether these early unions 1) are associated with intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization, 2) interrupt victim continuity or victim–offender overlap through protective and prosocial bonds, or 3) are inconsequential. By using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (N = 11,928; 18–34 years of age), we examine competing hypotheses for the effect of early union timing among victims of youth violence (n = 2,479)—differentiating across victimization only, perpetration only, and mutually combative relationships and considering variation by gender. The results from multinomial logistic regression models indicate that YVV increases the risk of IPV victimization in first unions, regardless of union timing; the null effect of timing indicates that delaying union formation would not reduce youth victims’ increased risk of continued victimization. Gender-stratified analyses reveal that earlier unions can protect women against IPV perpetration, but this is partly the result of an increased risk of IPV victimization. The findings suggest that YVV has significant transformative consequences, leading to subsequent victimization by coresidential partners, and this association might be exacerbated among female victims who form early unions. We conclude by discussing directions for future research.

Testing For Temporally Differentiated Relationships Among Potentially Criminogenic Places And Census Block Street Robbery Counts
Cory P. Haberman And Jerry H. Ratcliffe

This study examined street robbery patterns in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from the years 2009 to 2011 to determine whether the effects of potentially criminogenic places are different across different periods of the day. Census block (N = 13,164) street robbery counts across four periods (6:45 a.m. to 9:59 a.m., 10:00 a.m. to 4:29 p.m., 4:30 p.m. to 9:14 p.m., and 9:15 p.m. to 6:44 a.m.) were modeled with 12 different potentially criminogenic places, 3 measures of illicit markets, 4 compositional control variables, and spatially lagged versions of the 12 potentially criminogenic places and population using simultaneously estimated negative binomial regression models. Differences in the magnitudes of the parameter estimates across the time periods were assessed with Wald tests. Overall, the patterns across the four models were mostly consistent with the effects hypothesized based on the study's crime pattern theory and time-geography theoretical frame; yet differences in the magnitudes of the coefficients were less pronounced than hypothesized. Overall, the results provide moderate support for the crime pattern theory and time-geography explanation of spatial-temporal robbery patterns; however, numerous points are raised for future crime and place research.

A Threshold Model Of Collective Crime
Jean Marie Mcgloin And Zachary R. Rowan

The group nature of offending has been recognized as an inherent characteristic of criminal behavior, yet our insight on the decision to engage in group crime is limited. This article argues that a threshold model offers broad appeal to understand this decision. After discussing the basis of this model and its applicability to collective crime, we offer one example of the kind of research that could stem from this model. Specifically, by using survey data from 583 university students, this study asked respondents to self-report thresholds for group theft and destruction of property. By experimentally manipulating characteristics of the hypothetical scenario used to measure thresholds, we investigated both the individual- and situational-level correlates of these self-reported thresholds. The discussion considers the results that emerge from a Tobit regression model and offers suggestions for future research that would provide further refinement of the threshold model.