What effect does inequality have on residents’ sense of safety? Exploring the mediating processes of social capital and civic engagement

Datos Bibliográficos

ID12065702
AutoresCharles R Collins (0000-0001-6425-4550, University of Washington Bothell, autor de correspondencia), Shelby Guidry (University of Washington Bothell)
Año2018
Volumen40
Número7
Páginas1009-1026
Fecha de publicación2018-03-09
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaJournal of Urban Affairs (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0735-2166 • E-ISSN: 1467-9906
EditorialTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/07352166.2018.1439338
OpenAlexW2790537084
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas15
Referencias citadas85

A sense of safety and security is of the utmost importance for most residents because it contributes to personal and collective well-being. However, that sense of safety may rest upon community structural factors such as inequality and intracommunity factors such as social capital and civic engagement. In fact, these factors may mediate the relationship between inequality and residents’ sense of safety. As such, the purpose of this study is to investigate this process—the extent to which social capital and civic engagement partially mediate the relationship between economic inequality and sense of safety across 26 U.S. metro areas. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), we found that social capital fully mediates the relationship between inequality and sense of safety but that civic engagement does not. Specifically, residents in communities characterized by high levels of inequality also report reduced levels of social capital, which then results in a lower sense of safety. Additionally, residents who report lower civic engagement report that their communities are less safe

Capital (architecture · Civic engagement · Demographic economics · Economics · Geography · Inequality · Political science · Politics · Sense of community · Social capital · Social engagement · Social inequality · Social mobility · Social science · Sociology · Structural equation modeling · Community Health and Development · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Law · Psychology · Social Psychology · Urban, Neighborhood, and Segregation Studies