Robberies with guns: Neighborhood factors and the nature of crime

Author: Warner, B. D.
Publication: Journal of Criminal Justice
Topics: Crime Criminology Law Enforcement Social Science Urban/Rural
Keywords: ROBBERY
Bibliographic information +

This study compares neighborhood-level predictors of non-commercial robberies committed with guns to predictors of other (non-gun) non-commercial robberies. Extending earlier sociological research on “oppositional culture” and guns and literature from the field of criminology on social disorganization theory and crime, the author explores the hypothesis that in neighborhoods characterized by high levels of oppositional culture (e.g., neighborhoods with low levels of faith in the police) non-commercial robberies will more likely involve an armed offender than robberies in neighborhoods with low levels of oppositional culture. The study, of 29 neighborhoods in a mid-size city, used data from surveys with neighborhood residents on oppositional culture (e.g., “do your neighbors feel it is ok to use drugs?) and feelings about the police and linked these data to data from the Census. In a statistical model that controlled for neighborhood-level poverty, the fraction of households that were headed by women, and racial composition, as well as the demographic characteristics of robbery victims and offenders, the author found that in neighborhoods in which more people had more faith in the police, fewer robberies involved guns. Contrary to the author’s expectation, she found no association between the level of “oppositional culture” in a neighborhood and the probability that a non-commercial robbery involved a gun.