Crime Prevention, Disorder and Community Safety (Criminolgy) Essay

Crime Prevention, Disorder and Community Safety (Criminolgy) - Essay Example In reality, the term "fear of crime" is an artifact of a broad interest in what is presumed to be the psychological effect of crime. As a result, there is no clear rationale behind its use.† Researches indicate that people especially women fear crime more than men but they do not report it quite often so it can be concluded that the actual statistics of women victimization is higher than reported. Stanko (1992) observed that according to the surveys, males are more capable of being victimized than women despite of the fact that women show more insecure behavior. It is perceived that the fear is irrational and unrealistic. However it should be noted that crimes happened with women are not reported all the time as women are more sensitive to their social image than man thus less willing to report that they are being victimized. Young (1988: 174) wrote that: "Domestic crisis and sexual crimes are less likely to enter the statistics than property crimes, which leads to the systemat ic underestimation of crimes against women". It should also be considered that researches and surveys only consist of crimes happened in front of witnesses or road-crimes. Women are often victimized within the walls of their own homes and do not report to any one. Warr (1984, 1985) investigates that as women are scared more of sexual assault than men so the general fear gets mix with the fear of sexual assault and heighten their insecurity. He also suggested that women's fear of victimization should be differently analyzed than men as men rarely fears sexual assault. Keane (1995) suggested that women’s fear of crime consists of two fears basically i.e. concrete fear and formless fear. Concrete fears are the fears of some specific crimes while formless fear is general fear or fear that can not be associated with some specific crimes. This theory of Keane has an underlying assumption that some crimes are more fear inducing than others. For women sexual assault is more fear indu cing than any type of theft or property damages. As per Keane, women reported both types of fears whether concrete or formless but younger females reported more of a concrete fear than elderly ladies. It can be deduced that elder age feels more formless fear than younger. Elders are more sensitive and insecure in perceiving crimes and have less tolerance for it. According to the researches of Warr (1985) and Ferraro (1996), women perceive rape as much serious crime as a murder. After an extensive research work by Ferraro (1996), he concluded that elder women and younger women both report the highest level of fear however the basis of fear can be different entirely. The elder women are more sensitive about the risk of financial damage, risk of being injured or loss of life while younger women are more scared of sexual assault. The fear of younger women is mostly comprises of rape or harassment and is more dominant in them than any other fear. The main difference in the reasons of fea r is the fear of sexual assault. If this fear will be excluded from the fear of crime in women, the difference between male and female fears of being victimized will be reduced. Warr (1985) also reported that women who are below the age of 35 fear more of sexual assault. As per him, as the girls become older, their fear increases and as they become women and start to age the fear diminishes. However as per Kennedy and Silverman (1984), as they become more