Not ‘Islands, Entire of Themselves’: Exploring the Spatial Context of City-level Robbery Rates

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The current study examines spatial dependence in robbery rates for a sample of 1,056 cities with 25,000 or more residents over the 2000–2003 period. Although commonly considered in some macro-level research, spatial processes have not been examined in relation to city-level variation in robbery. The...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Deane, Glenn D. (Author)
Contributors: Messner, Steven F. ; Stucky, Thomas D. ; McGeever, Kelly ; Kubrin, Charis Elizabeth
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Published: 2008
In: Journal of quantitative criminology
Year: 2008, Volume: 24, Issue: 4, Pages: 363-380
Online Access: Presumably Free Access
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Keywords:
State-level covariates
Spatial weights
Spatial dependence
City-level robbery rates
Description
Summary:The current study examines spatial dependence in robbery rates for a sample of 1,056 cities with 25,000 or more residents over the 2000–2003 period. Although commonly considered in some macro-level research, spatial processes have not been examined in relation to city-level variation in robbery. The results of our regression analyses suggest that city robbery rates are not spatially independent. We find that spatial dependence is better accounted for by spatial error models than by spatial lag models. Further exploration of various spatial weights matrices indicates that robbery rates of cities within the same state are related to robbery rates of other cities within the same state, regardless of their proximity. Our analyses illustrate how systematic inquiry into spatial processes can alert researchers to important omitted variable biases and identify intriguing problems for future research.
ISSN:1573-7799
DOI:10.1007/s10940-008-9049-3