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Crime Control in America: What Works?

CHAPTER

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Crime Control in the Community and in Schools

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Community Crime Control

• Two ways to view community crime control

▪ Crime control through financial assistance to communities

• Enterprise zones

• Community development block grants

• Weed and seed

▪ Crime control by members of the community

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

The Social Ecology of Crime

• What is the social ecological model of crime?

▪ Seeks to explain aggregate crime rates

• Predictors

▪ Poverty

▪ Mobility

▪ Race

▪ Density

▪ Familial breakdown

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Poverty

• Crime is concentrated in impoverished areas

• Poverty tends to be linked to crime, but the relationship may be mediated by other factors, such as mobility

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Mobility and Change

• What is population mobility?

▪ Turnover

• How could mobility influence crime?

▪ May lead to a reduction in informal social control

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Racial Composition

• Consensus in the literature is that the percentage of blacks in a community is associated with the incidence of violent crime

• The relationship may be mediated by such factors as

▪ Family composition

▪ Poverty

▪ Mobility

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Population Density

• Density is not the same as mobility

• Density is concerned with the how crowded neighborhoods are

• How could density influence crime?

▪ More crime where there are more people

▪ Crowding could lead to frustration

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Familial Breakdown

• Family disruption tends to be linked to crime

• Measures

▪ Percentage of single mother households

▪ Female-headed households

▪ Divorce rate

• What is the pathway to crime?

▪ Low parental supervision

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Social Disorganization and Collective Efficacy

• Combining the foregoing explanations of community crime rates together yields social disorganization theory

• A recent offshoot of social disorganization theory is the notion of collective efficacy

▪ Shared expectations and mutual engagement

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Concentrated Disadvantage

• What is concentrated disadvantage?

▪ It is a combination of:

• Poverty

• Family disruption

• Racial composition

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Communities and Crime: A Two-Way Relationship?

• So far we have only conceived of community structure causing crime

• What if crime alters community structure?

• Crime appears to affect:

▪ Fear

▪ Withdrawal

▪ Decisions to move

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Financial Assistance to Communities

• Three such efforts have been popular

▪ Enterprise zones

▪ Community Development Block Grants

▪ Weed and Seed

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Enterprise Zones

• Enterprise zones are economically depressed areas where incentives are provided to employers such that job development is encouraged

• Are enterprise zones effective?

▪ Researchers have mostly looked at employment levels and job creation, not crime

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Community Development Block Grants

• The Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program was created in 1974

▪ Managed by HUD today

▪ Provides formula grants through several channels

• Effects on crime?

▪ No one has appeared to study the effects of the CDBG program on crime

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Other Methods of Community Crime Control

• Much community crime control takes place without financial assistance

▪ Community mobilization

▪ Anti-gang initiatives

▪ Youth mentoring

▪ After school programs

▪ Publicity campaigns

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

School-Based Crime Control

• Much crime control also takes place in our nation's schools

• Why?

▪ To fill the void left by parents/guardians who cannot always supervise their children

▪ To make schools safer

▪ To shape children's behavior

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

School-Based Crime Control

• Methods

▪ Targeting students

▪ Targeting the school environment

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Targeting the School Environment

• Some schools are run better than others

• Who cares?

▪ Poorly run schools may be breeding grounds for crime

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Building Administrative Capacity

• Building administrative capacity refers to methods of improving administration

• Examples

▪ Program Development Education

▪ School Development Program

• What does the research show?

▪ It appears very effective

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Normative Education

• Normative education refers to:

▪ Setting norms

▪ Setting student guidelines

▪ Setting expectations for behavior

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Normative Education

• Examples

▪ Safe Dates Program

▪ Start Taking Alcohol Seriously

• Does it work?

▪ The evidence is encouraging

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Managing Classrooms and Instruction

• Here we are concerned with nontraditional methods of classroom management/instruction

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Managing Classrooms and Instruction

• Examples

▪ Altering teacher/student ratio

▪ Accommodating different learning styles

▪ Increase in out-of-class activities

• What does the research show?

▪ It is mixed, probably because of the diversity of interventions in this area

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Separate Classrooms for At-Risk Youths

• Placing disruptive/at-risk students in the same room as good students can threaten learning

• The result?

▪ Separate instruction for disruptive/at- risk students

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Separate Classrooms for At-Risk Youths

• Does it work?

▪ Little attention has been given to crime, but such interventions appear to affect drug use, conduct problems, and truancy

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Targeting Students

• The school-based approaches already discussed targeted the school environment (mostly)

• Now we are concerned with changing students themselves

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Targeting Students

• Examples

▪ Instructional interventions

▪ DARE

▪ GREAT

▪ Behavior modification

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Drug Abuse Resistance Education

• DARE is the most common method of anti-drug education in America's schools

• It usually operates in the 5th and 6th grades

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Drug Abuse Resistance Education

• Does it work?

▪ Almost all evaluations of DARE show it is a failure

• Why does it persist?

▪ Public image

▪ Other political motivations

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Gang Resistance Education

• Gang Resistance Education and Training (GREAT) was modeled after DARE

• GREAT consists of 8 lessons taught to middle-school students

• Does it work?

▪ GREAT shows more promise than DARE, but the evidence is scant—and mixed

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Behavior Modification

• Behavior modification is concerned with changing behavior through a system of rewards and punishment

• Does it work?

▪ It appears to work well with at-risk individuals, such as disruptive students

▪ Outcomes in most of the research have not included crime

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Other Methods of Crime Control in Schools

• Many other methods of crime control in schools can be identified

• Examples

▪ Student Assistance Program

▪ Mentoring and tutoring programs

▪ Job training in schools

▪ School-based recreation/after-school programs

continued on next slide

Crime Control in America: What Works?, 3e John L. Worrall

Other Methods of Crime Control in Schools

• Do they work?

▪ Again, little research is available