This study introduces filtering theory from housing economics to criminology and measures the age of housing as a proxy for deterioration and physical disorder. Using data for Los Angeles County in 2009 to 2011, negative binomial regression models are estimated and find that street segments with older housing have higher levels of all six crime types tested. Street segments with more housing age diversity have higher levels of all crime types, whereas housing age diversity in the surrounding ½-mile area is associated with lower levels of crime. Street segments with detached single-family units generally had less crime compared with other types of housing. Street segments with large apartment complexes (five or more units) generally have more crime than those with small apartment complexes and duplexes.

You can access the freely available article by Dr. John R. Hipp, Dr. Young-an Kim, & Dr. Kevin Kane online first in Crime & Delinquency entitled, “The effect of the physical environment on crime rates: Capturing housing age and housing type at varying spatial scales”.

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http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X16307931

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Whereas existing research typically treats the variability in residents’ reports of collective efficacy and neighboring as measurement error, we consider such variability as of substantive interest in itself. This variability may indicate disagreement among residents with implications for the neighborhood collectivity. We propose using a general measure of social distance based on several social dimensions (rather than measures based on a single dimension such as racial/ethnic heterogeneity or income inequality) to help understand this variability in assessments.  We use data from Wave I (2001) of the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhoods Study (N = 3,570) to aggregate respondents into egohoods of two different sizes: ¼ mile and ½ mile radii. Consistent with our expectations, neighborhoods with higher levels of general social distance have higher variability in the reports of neighboring and the two components of collective efficacy – cohesion and informal social control.

You can access the freely available article by Dr. John R. Hipp, Seth A. Williams, & Dr. Adam Boessen in Socius entitled, “Disagreement in Assessing Collective Efficacy: The Role of Social Distance”. The article examines variability in perceptions of collective efficacy among residents in neighborhoods in Los Angeles.

Get it here:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0049089X16307931

[Read more…] about Lab publication studying neighborhood social distance and disagreement in assessing collective efficacy