All Offenders Are Equal, But Some Are More Equal Than Others: Variation In Journeys To Crime Between Offenders
Author(s)
Townsley, Michael
Sidebottom, Aiden
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2010
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The results of this study reveal a major methodological problem with an established body of criminological literature-the journey to crime. The dominant finding of such research is that most crimes occur close to an offender's home. Consequently, journeys to crime typically display a distance-decay function that is assumed to exist between and within offenders. However, most journey-to-crime studies use nested data-individual offenders contributing multiple crime trips-yet employ analytic methods that fail to account for this property, leading to inference and aggregation concerns. In the study outlined in this ...
View more >The results of this study reveal a major methodological problem with an established body of criminological literature-the journey to crime. The dominant finding of such research is that most crimes occur close to an offender's home. Consequently, journeys to crime typically display a distance-decay function that is assumed to exist between and within offenders. However, most journey-to-crime studies use nested data-individual offenders contributing multiple crime trips-yet employ analytic methods that fail to account for this property, leading to inference and aggregation concerns. In the study outlined in this article, we demonstrated the implications of using nested data for analyzing the journey to crime. We showed that once controlling for nesting, only a few (prolific) offenders display a distance decay pattern. Implications of the findings for theory and future research are discussed.
View less >
View more >The results of this study reveal a major methodological problem with an established body of criminological literature-the journey to crime. The dominant finding of such research is that most crimes occur close to an offender's home. Consequently, journeys to crime typically display a distance-decay function that is assumed to exist between and within offenders. However, most journey-to-crime studies use nested data-individual offenders contributing multiple crime trips-yet employ analytic methods that fail to account for this property, leading to inference and aggregation concerns. In the study outlined in this article, we demonstrated the implications of using nested data for analyzing the journey to crime. We showed that once controlling for nesting, only a few (prolific) offenders display a distance decay pattern. Implications of the findings for theory and future research are discussed.
View less >
Journal Title
Criminology
Volume
48
Issue
3
Copyright Statement
Self-archiving of the author-manuscript version is not yet supported by the American Society of Criminology. Please refer to the journal link for access to the definitive, published version or contact the author for more information.
Subject
Criminology
Police administration, procedures and practice
Applied ethics
Philosophy