Income inequality and fear of crime across the European region

This paper aims to take a holistic approach to studying fear of crime by testing predictors at multiple levels of analyses. Data from the European Social Survey (N = 56,752 from 29 countries) were used to test and extend the Income Inequality and Sense of Vulnerability Hypotheses. The findings confi...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Vauclair, Christin-Melanie (Author) ; Bratanova, Boyka (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Published: 2017
In: European journal of criminology
Year: 2017, Volume: 14, Issue: 2, Pages: 221-241
Online Access: Presumably Free Access
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Keywords:
Cross-national comparisons
European Social Survey
Fear of crime
Income inequality
Multilevel analyses
Subjective well-being
Description
Summary:This paper aims to take a holistic approach to studying fear of crime by testing predictors at multiple levels of analyses. Data from the European Social Survey (N = 56,752 from 29 countries) were used to test and extend the Income Inequality and Sense of Vulnerability Hypotheses. The findings confirm that (1) individuals in societies with greater income inequalities are more fearful of crime, and (2) older or disabled people as well as women report greater fear of crime. Contrary to the hypotheses, ethnic majority and not ethnic minority members report greater fear of crime, if they reside in high income inequality countries. It is further demonstrated that fear of crime explains the inverse association between income inequality and subjective well-being in this particular subsample.
ISSN:1741-2609
DOI:10.1177/1477370816648993