Fear of Crime

Measurement of Fear of Crime

The most common measurement of fear of crime used by researchers, especially in the early years of fear of crime research, uses national data sets or regional equivalents. Researchers adopt a single item question from either the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) or the General Social Survey (GSS) to measure fear of crime. The NCVS asks people, “How safe do you feel or would you feel being out alone in your neighborhood at night? During the day?” The GSS asks people, “Is there any area right around here—that is, within a mile or so—where you would be afraid to walk at night?” Both questions are very similar in style and intent and try to capture a generalized fear of crime in the person being interviewed.

Several researchers criticized this reliance on single-question data for its limited scope and its exclusion of a broader range of crimes. Although crimes that take place at night in public places (i.e., street crime) do provoke high levels of fear, many other situations that may occur during the day or at home or outside the neighborhood are overlooked. These limited questions lead to imprecision and potentially inaccurate conclusions, because general measures tend to mask variation in fear of crime across offenses, as well as possibly overestimating the level of fear in the general public.

More sophisticated approaches to measuring fear of crime focus on specific fears and the fear of harm caused by personal violence. This approach has greatly expanded the understanding that fear of crime is not universally distributed in response to different crimes. Further clarification was offered by identifying trust as an underlying factor in fear of crime. The work of Kenneth Ferraro (1995) and others reconceptualized fear of crime by differentiating fear from perceived risk and recognizing that risk is not a sufficient explanation in and of itself, but a necessary factor in the fear of crime equation. Relying primarily on a national sample, Ferraro explores the significance of both objective and perceived risk on fear of crime, suggesting that the fear of crime is mostly mediated through perceived risk of crime. and since people rely on local conditions, such as those in their neighborhood, to make judgments about personal risk, it follows that some social groups will perceive higher risks, and fear of crime will vary according to individual and situational factors.

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