NCJ Number
188971
Journal
Justice Quarterly Volume: 18 Issue: 2 Dated: June 2001 Pages: 301-321
Date Published
June 2001
Length
21 pages
Annotation
This study used secondary data analysis to examine the perceptions of 621 black individuals in 8 urban neighborhoods in Atlanta and Washington, DC, regarding the seriousness of specific crimes.
Abstract
The neighborhoods were stratified by crime rate and income level. The research used the literature exploring perception formation and attitudes toward crime seriousness to develop the hypothesis that individual-level variables, community-level variables, experiential variables, and the motive for the crime will influence participants’ perceptions of crime seriousness. The study reanalyzed data from a 1981 research project focusing on race and crime. That study asked participants to rate the seriousness of six hypothetical crime scenarios. These involved embezzlement, arson, armed robbery, purchasing stolen goods, prostitution, and a black male’s killing of a police officer who used racial slurs and threatened to kill the black male. Results of six multiple regression models suggested that gender, age, community crime rate, city of residence, religiosity, and fear of crime significantly influenced participants attitudes toward crime. Young men living in high-crime communities who were not religious and did not fear crime were most likely to justify the actions of the offenders depicted in the scenarios by regarding their crimes as less serious, regardless of the type of crime or the motive. Findings suggested that tolerance or justification of criminal activity depends partly on the degree to which an individual can identify with the perpetrator. Findings challenged the assumption that considerable consensus exists regarding perceptions of crime seriousness. Tables, footnotes, and 64 references (Author abstract modified)