Structural neighbourhood characteristics, perceived collective efficacy and perceived disorder: a multilevel study on fear of crime

Abstract This study examines whether residential stability and neighbourhood SES, two key neighbourhood structural characteristics from Social Disorganisation Theory (SDT), have a contextual effect on perceived social trust, perceived informal social control, and perceived social disorder and whether these contextual structural and perceptual measures are related to three measures of fear of crime, independent of population composition. Attention is paid to three well-known dimensions of fear of crime: risk perception (cognitive), fear (emotional) and avoidance behaviour (behavioural). The results demonstrate that neighbourhood residential stability is strongly related to perceptual measures of collective efficacy (perceived social trust and perceived informal social control) and perceived social disorder, controlling for demographic background characteristics and individual level social capital. The implications of these findings and avenues for future studies are discussed.