Do changes in residents' fear of crime impact their walking? Longitudinal results from RESIDE
Introduction
Intuitively, we expect that the perception of an unsafe environment will induce people to constrain their walking or physical activity. However, whilst studies investigating the neighbourhood influences on physical activity routinely include some measure of perceived crime or safety, the findings in adult samples remain largely inconclusive (Foster and Giles-Corti, 2008). One critique of studies examining the relationship between perceptions of safety from crime and physical activity is a reliance on judgements or cognitive assessments of crime and safety, rather than emotional or affective responses to crime. For instance, it is plausible that people may judge an area to be unsafe due to crime, but unless the crime they perceive causes an emotional response, such as fear or anxiety, it may not impact their behaviour (Foster and Giles-Corti, 2008).
Relatively few studies investigating the impact of perceived safety on physical activity have incorporated measures best conceptualised as ‘fear of crime’ (Dawson et al., 2007, Foster et al., 2013c, Kramer et al., 2013, McGinn et al., 2008, Roman et al., 2009, Ross, 2000, Stafford, 2007). For example, in a sample of African Americans living in urban public housing developments, fear of crime was not associated with moderate intensity physical activity (Roman et al., 2009). In contrast, among older British civil servants, participation in vigorous intensity physical activities was lower among those reporting greater fear of crime, although there was no association with walking (Stafford, 2007). Similarly in the Netherlands, lower fear of crime was associated with increased odds of cycling (Kramer et al., 2013), and elsewhere, both Ross (2000) and Foster et al., 2013a, Foster et al., 2013b, Foster et al., 2013c identified that people who feared victimisation were less likely to walk (Foster et al., 2013c, Ross, 2000). Whilst there is some mixed evidence, on balance, these studies suggest that fear of crime may indeed be a deterrent to walking or physical activity.
Another limitation of studies examining crime-related safety and physical activity has been a reliance on cross-sectional study designs, with few studies using prospective or longitudinal designs (Dawson et al., 2007, Handy et al., 2008, Sallis et al., 2007). Moreover, just one longitudinal study appears to include an emotional measure of crime safety (Dawson et al., 2007). Dawson et al. (2007) examined perceived barriers to walking for older adults participating in a walking programme in the UK. Whilst they identified that worry about personal safety (e.g., being attacked) reduced at follow-up, this was not examined as a separate influence on changes in physical activity between baseline and follow-up. Indeed, to date, no studies appear to have examined the impact of changes in emotional responses to crime, such as fear of crime, on walking or physical activity.
This study addresses an important evidence gap by examining the influence of fear of crime on walking using a longitudinal study design. We examined: (1) whether changes in fear of crime influence changes in walking undertaken within the neighbourhood; and (2) whether the relationship between fear of crime and walking could be explained by other variables. Numerous individual, social and built environment factors have been associated with walking, including: neighbourhood perceptions (e.g., attractive aesthetics, physical disorder, traffic) (Cerin et al., 2009, Mendes de Leon et al., 2009, Nagel et al., 2008, Sugiyama and Ward-Thompson, 2008), aspects of social capital (e.g., social cohesion, collective efficacy) (Foster et al., 2013c, Mendes de Leon et al., 2009, Wen et al., 2007) and neighbourhood ‘walkability’ (Owen et al., 2007). Thus, we controlled for a range of factors to better illuminate any independent relationship between fear of crime and walking (see Fig. 1).
Section snippets
Study context
The RESIDential Environments (RESIDE) Project is a longitudinal natural experiment of people building houses and relocating to 73 new housing developments across Perth, Western Australia. All people building new homes in the study areas were invited to participate by the state water authority following the land transfer transaction (response rate of 33.4%). Participants completed a self-report questionnaire before they moved into their home (n = 1813), and on three occasions after relocation at
Results
Participants who completed both the baseline and follow-up surveys were on average 1.6 years older than those who completed baseline only. There were no significant differences in the other socio-demographic or walking variables, indicating that participant attrition did not influence the associations observed.
The mean changes in objective built environment variables and neighbourhood perceptions between baseline and follow-up are shown in Table 2. Change in fear of crime was the only variable
Discussion
For this sample of suburban residents, we found longitudinal evidence that increases in fear of crime were associated with decreases in the time spent walking in the neighbourhood. The relationship was most pronounced for total walking, however these associations also held true for recreational and transport walking. Whilst previous cross-sectional studies suggest a negative relationship between fear of crime and walking (Foster et al., 2013c, Ross, 2000) or physical activity (Dawson et al.,
Conclusion
This study provides longitudinal evidence that changes in residents' fear of crime influence their walking behaviours. We found that for every one level increase in fear of crime, participants walking inside their neighbourhood reduced by over 22 min, even after full adjustment. Thus, interventions that target resident's fear of crime may be a means to increase walking and improve public health outcomes. However, in order to design better interventions, there is a need to understand what factors
Conflict of interest statement
The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.
Acknowledgments
This research was funded by the Western Australian Health Promotion Foundation (Healthway) (#11828, #18922) and an Australian Research Council (ARC) Linkage grant (#LP0455453). The first author is supported by a Healthway Health Promotion Research Fellowship (#21363), the third author by an NHMRC Centre for Research Excellence in Healthy, Liveable Communities (#1061404), the fourth author by an NHMRC/National Heart Foundation Early Career Fellowship (#1036350) and the last author by an NHMRC
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2022, Wellbeing, Space and SocietyCitation Excerpt :However, an objectively measured safe place (based on reported crime) may be different to a place experienced subjectively as safe by residents (Cutts et al., 2009; Foster et al., 2016; Kyttä et al., 2014). Analyses of longitudinal data from the RESIDE study suggests a causal relationship between an increase over time in participants’ fear of crime – a subjective response - and a decline in time spent walking for transport and recreation (Foster et al., 2014). Various findings of the RESIDE study support the view that walking is influenced by a melding of neighbourhood people, place and traffic perceptions and attributes, both as they are subjectively experienced and can be objectively measured.