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Are elderly men worried about crime?
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Journal of Aging Studies 21 (2007) 336 – 346 www.elsevier.com/locate/jaging
Are elderly men worried about crime? Marie Beaulieu a,⁎, Micheline Dubé b , Christian Bergeron c , Marie-Marthe Cousineau d a
Université de Sherbrooke, Department of Social Work and Research Center on Aging, Health and Social Services Center — University Institute of Geriatrics of Sherbrooke, 1036, Belvedere South, Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada J1H 4C4 b Department of Psychology, University of Québec at Trois-Rivières (UQTR), Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada G9A 5H7 c Research Center on Aging, Health and Social Services Center — University Institute of Geriatrics of Sherbrooke, Canada d School of Criminology, University of Montreal, International Center of Compared Criminology, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3C 3J7 Received 2 March 2007; received in revised form 2 May 2007; accepted 27 May 2007
Abstract It has been well documented that older adults, especially women, are more inclined to express fear of crime, but their risk of victimization is significantly lower than for people from other age groups. Even if gender issues related to fear are known, fear of crime among men is undocumented. This article explores how worry about victimization among older men (N = 156), from 3 francophone cities in Quebec, Canada, is influenced by age groups (60–69, 70–79 and 80 years old and over), health, depression, social support and prior victimization. There are significant results associated with the 3 dimensions of worry about crime (emotional, behavioural and cognitive). We conclude by commenting on the following question: Is worry about crime among elderly men a reality? © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Gender; Men; Fear of crime; Worry about victimization; Elderly
1. Introduction The field of masculinity has rapidly evolved during the last decade. Many issues have been covered, such as: masculine identity development in school, gender relationships, pornographic use, etc. Seidler (2006) states that masculinity theories have emerged in part as response to both the radical feminist discourse, and to men who have adopted a “pro-feminist” approach. These theories have not given place to men's emotions and experiences. Certain authors, such as Weeks (2005), argue that research should not dichotomize men's and women's issues; while many others plead for studies done specifically with men in order to better understand their social and personal identities. The field of masculinity is also emerging in social gerontology. There appears to be a tendency in social research to promote a life course or life span approach to better capture the essence of aging and masculinity. In a context where older men are often invisible, there is an explicit need to understand aging men's issues (Fleming, 1999; Kosberg & ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 819 8211170x2270; fax: +1 819 829 7141. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Beaulieu), [email protected] (M. Dubé), [email protected] (C. Bergeron), [email protected] (M.-M. Cousineau). 0890-4065/$ - see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jaging.2007.05.001
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Mangum, 2002; Spector-Mercel, 2006). According to Spector-Mercel, Western hegemonic masculinity scripts have been: doubly truncated: first, as gendered scripts, and second, as masculine scripts. The ageist spiral that “covers” gender statuses with the domineering “old” label, together with the images of older men as invisible, unmasculine and a paradoxical social category, make it culturally unfeasible to be both a “true” man and an old person (2006, p. 78). There are major gaps in knowledge concerning older men, such as social participation (Thompson & Whearty, 2004), impact of disability (Fleming, 1999), men's rights (Kosberg & Mangum, 2002), older male's heterosexual life (Kosberg, 2002), etc. In this respect, not much is known regarding more personal and social vulnerability aspects of older men's lives; such as victimization, sense of frailty, insecurity, or fear of crime. Fear of crime emerged as a research domain in the 1960s (Lee, 2001). Since then, it has been a continuous preoccupation on the part of researchers, interveners, political decision-makers (Possamaï & Murray, 2004), and mass media (Lee, 2001). Research results affirm that the elderly (Chadee & Ditton, 2003), especially elderly women (Keane, 1992; Ortega & Myles, 1987), manifest the most fear of crime, even if statistically they are part of the group the least at risk of being victimized (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005; Jackson, 2004; Possamaï & Murray, 2004). This phenomenon is now known as “the fear of victimization paradox” (Hale, 1996). In 1988, Ferraro and LaGrange published, in this journal, an article entitled: “Are Older People Afraid of Crime?” The authors concluded that the fear of crime among the elderly requires more research in order to better understand this paradox. Researchers have advanced several explanations concerning the prevalence, causes, and consequences of fear of crime among the elderly. Besides age and sex, research suggests that this fear could also be related to certain sociodemographic variables such as size of city, race, income, education, and marital status (Haynie, 1998; also for a review of literature see Hale, 1996). Above all, the vulnerability of women in general, and especially that of elderly women, has often been associated with a higher fear of crime. The perception that women are more affected by the fear of crime than men seems to be well anchored; and has been, at the end of the day, the object of little questioning. In the last few years, researchers have made progress to better understand men in general (Moss & Moss, 2007), but only a few rare studies have been interested particularly in the fear of crime among men. Those which have (e.g., Haynie, 1998; Schafer, Huebner, & Bynum, 2006) concluded that, in effect, elderly men manifest a certain fear of crime; but these studies only evaluated gender differences. It remains to examine more precisely how the fear of crime manifests uniquely among elderly men. 2. Background Statistics on the prevalence of fear of crime have not really changed since the 1970s (Roberts, 2001). Depending on the type of data analysed, between 27% and 43% of the elderly are affected by fear of crime in Canada (Beaulieu, Leclerc, & Dubé, 2003; Roberts, 2001). As background information, four elements appear to us as central to this subject: fear of crime, perceived vulnerability with advanced age, the influence of past experiences of victimization, and the importance of analysis by gender. Worry about victimization What is fear of crime? Since the mid-90s, there has been a certain consensus that the fear of crime is composed of three dimensions: emotional, cognitive and behavioural (Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004; Williams, McShane, & Akers, 2000). However, most of the time each of these dimensions is measured specifically and analysed independently of the other two (Ferraro, 1995; Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004). The emotional dimension corresponds to an emotional evaluation of the fear of being victim of a criminal act (Rader, 2004). The emotional character of fear of crime manifests itself notably in response to statements about the sentiment of being afraid to walk alone day or night in one's neighbourhood (Hale, 1996). According to Greve (1998), this measure constitutes the best way to evaluate fear, as it possesses a strong emotional dimension. Yet this traditional question has been much criticized due to the fact that it may measure something other than fear of crime.
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The cognitive dimension evaluates the anticipated risk of being a victim of a criminal act (Gabriel & Greve, 2003; Rader, 2004). This allows the measurement of the probability of being victim of a series of specific crimes, as perceived by the person (Chadee & Ditton, 2003). The cognitive dimension contains two distinct aspects: The evaluation of the probability of being victim of a crime against the person, and that of being victim of a crime against property (Ferraro, 1995). The behavioural dimension makes reference to behaviours adopted to face possible victimization (Bergeron, Beaulieu, Dubé, & Cousineau, 2006). This includes behaviours of avoidance (not visiting certain places or people, staying home, etc.) and of protection (buying a gun, installing more secure locks on doors and windows, etc.) (Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004). Even though the literature tends to affirm that the comprehension of fear of crime should include these three dimensions, we found no definition that does. As well, given the great diversity of definitions of fear of crime, certain authors do not hesitate to qualify the expression fear of crime as unusable (Warr, 1984): an idea that is abstract and polysemous (Jackson, 2004). Consequently, Skogan (1987) suggests using the terms preoccupation and worry, rather than fear, given that fear refers more to an emotion. Our analysis of the existing literature leads us to conclude that it would be better to abandon the term fear for that of worry (Williams et al., 2000). We propose the following definition of worry about criminal victimization: A feeling expressed by avoidance or protection behaviours, an abstract fear when being in a perceived threatening environment, or a concrete evaluation of the risk of being a victim of a personal or personal-property attack. Vulnerability hypothesis as an explanation of fear of crime Generally, in the evaluation of physical and social vulnerability, the variables gender, age, race, income, level of education, marital status, and prior victimization are taken into consideration (Schafer et al., 2006). Personal vulnerability is determinant in the intensity of the sentiment of insecurity felt in the face of the eventuality of being a victim (Dittmann, 2005). Furthermore, the hypothesis of perceived vulnerability remains the best explanation of the gender gap in fear of crime (Smith, Torstensson, & Johansson, 2000). In other words, the variations in the sentiment of insecurity are explained by the structures of age and gender in a given society (Dittmann, 2005). Thus, the elderly and women of all ages estimate themselves to be more vulnerable than younger adults and men in general; given their low capacity to defend themselves against a perpetrator (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005). As well, women are more apt to perceive risk than their masculine counterparts (Smith & Torstensson, 1997). Aging men are less conscious of their increasing vulnerability and continue to see themselves as independent, active, and valuing privacy (Moss & Moss, 2007). This vision corresponds to cultural norms in industrialized societies: e.g., social roles, machismo and masculinity (WHO, 2001). Influence of an experience of victimization on fear of crime Some researchers affirm that past experiences of victimization could explain a person's worry and perceived risk of being a victim (Amerio & Roccato, 2005; Dittmann, 2005). For example, the victims of physical assault are more inclined afterwards to express worry and to perceive more risks than do people who were not victims of this form of aggression (Smith & Torstensson, 1997; Smith et al., 2000). Conversely, other studies reveal that people who were victimized do not express more worry than others about crime (Moore & Shepherd, 2006). The role of previous victimization, then, is not yet clearly established in the literature as an explanation of the advent of a man's or a woman's worry about crime. Is there a link between a type of past victimization and the fear of certain specific types of crime, whether or not they are identical to the past victimization? Necessity for an analysis of worry about crime by gender For a long time, gender has constituted the variable the most strongly associated with insecurity (Haynie, 1998). Wanting to explain why worry about crime seems to affect women more than men, regardless of age (e.g., Ferraro, 1995; Fattah & Sacco, 1989), certain authors suggest that results must be analysed while accounting for social desirability. Sutton and Farrall (2005) have, in effect, shown that men, more than women, feel a social pressure to repress the expression of fear. In other words, the masculine taboo dictates that a man does not express the sentiment of
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fear. Social roles related to being a man, measured with the aid of a social desirability scale, explain, in a valid way, the data related to worry about crime. Thus, men are responding in a socially desirable fashion (Sutton & Farrall, 2005): “… men who are most concerned with giving socially desirable responses, and who therefore score highest on lie scales, ought to report the least fear of crime. This negative correlation should not occur for women, or at least should be weaker, because female gender roles are not so prohibitive with regard to admitting these sorts of fears” (p. 214). This leads us to stipulate that fear of crime could be much more important for men than it appears to be according to the literature. These findings are corroborated by Goodey (1997). All this background information leads us to affirm the social and scientific pertinence of treating worry about crime among men specifically, while accounting for the three components (cognitive, emotional and behavioural). 3. Research objectives The objective of the current article is to develop a better comprehension of worry about victimization among elderly men 60 years of age and over in Quebec (Canada). This involves identifying the variables that best predict the risk of being troubled with this worry and seeing whether the same variables are implicated for each dimension (cognitive, emotional, behavioural). The predictor variables retained are age group, size of municipality (metropolis or mid-size city), level of education, type of lodging, prior victimization, health, depression, and social support. Particular attention was given to different age cohorts and to variables measuring, amongst other things, physical and social vulnerability. 4. Data and method The data for this study come from a multi-center research project on criminal insecurities among the elderly that was conducted by mail questionnaires in 2005 and 2006, in three cities (one large: Montréal, 1.8 million inhabitants; and two mid-size: Sherbrooke and Trois-Rivières, around 150 000 inhabitants) of Quebec (Canada). The project respects the ethical conduct for research involving humans, and has been approved by the Research Ethic Board of the Universities of Sherbrooke, Montréal, and Québec at Trois-Rivières. All respondents had agreed via phone to answer the questionnaire. In total, 387 elderly persons, ranging from 60 to 98 years of age (M = 73.9, SD = 8.2), participated in the study. The sample was stratified and the data corrected (variables: city, age and gender) using populational data from the last available census (Statistique Canada, 2001) before proceeding with statistical analyses. Participants Only data from the male respondents (N = 156) were retained for the current article. The majority of these lived in a metropolis (N = 137: 87.8%), while the remainder (N = 19: 12.2%) lived in two mid-sized cities. They were divided among three age groups (60–69 years = 78 persons, 70–79 = 56, 80 and over = 22). They had a mean age of 71.4 years (SD = 7.1), 12.4 years of education (SD = 4.5) and lived mostly in couples (70%), in a house (46%) or an apartment (40%), and 36% declared an annual family income of less than $40,000. They did not present cognitive problems (M = 20.5 of 22) according to an abridged telephone version of the MMSE (Roccaforte, Burke, Bayer, & Wengel, 1992). All were francophone. Instruments The dependent variable, worry about criminal victimization, was evaluated with the Worry About Victimization (WAV, Williams et al., 2000), translated, adapted, and validated for an elderly francophone population (Authors, unpublished). The French version presents essentially the same internal consistency (Alpha varies from 0.67 to 0.95) as the original (0.61 to 0.93) and a test–retest reliability of 0.70 to 0.90 over a two-week period. The WAV contains 67 questions for 9 scales. Only the six scales that evaluate the cognitive, emotional, and behavioural dimensions were retained for the current study. Two scales measured the emotional dimension. The National Crime Survey (NCS), or Walking Worry About Crime (NCS, 12 items), seeks to determine to what point the participant is preoccupied by crime. The typical question is: “Is
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there any area within four blocks of your home where you would be worried about walking (alone or with someone else)?” Concern About Crime in General (CONCERN) contains only one question, “How concerned are you about crime in general?”, to which the person responds on a scale from 0 (not worried) to 10 (very worried). We also used scales to measure the behavioural dimension. General Behavioural Precautions (BEHAVE1, 10 items) enumerates the precautions taken before going out to guard against the eventuality of victimization. These precautions include never walking alone, carrying a whistle, carrying a cell-phone, etc. The general response directive is: “Do you take any of these measures for safety against crime?” Home Behavioural Precautions (BEHAVE2, 14 items) evaluates the precautions taken by the person at home to protect against crime. These precautions include installing more locks on doors and windows, installing an alarm system, etc. The scale is introduced by the question: “Have you done any of these things around the house?”, and followed by a list of 14 types of precautions. Two scales evaluated the cognitive dimension, with scores ranging from 0 to 10, with 10 as highest chance. Perception of Victimization Risk (PERRISK) contains one question: “What do you think your chances are of being a victim of any type of crime during this coming year?” Worry About Victimization (WORRY, 16 items) asks: “How you feel about your chances of being a victim of any of these offences during this coming year?” Several instruments serve to measure the independent variables. In Prior Victimization, with a series of 20 statements of forms of victimization, the person indicates whether he was a victim of each type of crime at one time or another in his life. He also indicates his relationship with the aggressor (i.e. spouse, child, other member of the family, acquaintance, etc.). The abridged version (15 items) of the Geriatric Depression Scale (Yesavage et al., 1983), translated and validated in French (Bourque, Blanchard, & Vézina, 1991), measures the depressive state of an elderly individual. An adaptation of the Social Functioning scale, developed during the Older Adult Resources and Services project (OARS) by Fillenbaum and Smyer (1981), was done by our team. It serves to evaluate three dimensions of the social support network: availability, utilization, and perceived satisfaction. The French version of the physical section of the Multifunctional Assessment Questionnaire (MFAQ) was used to indicate physical health (Lefrançois, Leclerc, & Poulin, 1995). It was designed to evaluate limitations in activities of daily living attributable to illnesses of an elderly person. A questionnaire gathered sociodemographic data. Treatment of data To perform logistic regression analyses, we transformed the WAV scales results, considered here as dependant variables, into dummy variables where the value 1 represented men who reported the highest number of cognitions, emotions, or behaviours (i.e. at or above the 75th percentile). We also constructed dummy variables for the following independent variables: city (Montreal = 1), cohabitation (alone = 1), education (less than 13 years = 1), type of lodging (house = 1), prior victimization (victim = 1), co-morbidity (2 illnesses or more = 1), and the three social network scales (weak network = 1). Depression (absence, light and severe) and age (60–69, 70–79, 80 and older) appear as threechoice categorical variables. Analysis The analysis plan contains four steps: 1) description of results for the dependent and independent variables, 2) a comparative analysis of means with ANOVA and the Bonferroni post-hoc tests, 3) linear regression of the dependent and independent variables, using non-adjusted odds ratios to determine the variables to include in a logistic regression, 4) multiple logistic regression with adjusted odds ratio for each dependent variable to identify predictive models. 5. Results Table 1 presents means and standard deviations for the variables in the study other than those enumerated in the description of participants. Globally, the elderly men in our sample reported a moderate level of worry about victimization (4.2 on a scale of 0 to 10). They adopted certain behaviours such as avoidance (M = 5.9 out of a possible 30), or protection (M = 4.1 out of a possible 14). They saw themselves as having low risk of being victim of a crime (M = 25.5 on a scale of 0 to 160), and estimated their chances of being victim of a crime in the next year as low (M = 1.5, on a scale of 0 to 10). These means are lower than those reported by Williams et al. (2000) for a general population (2000 individuals, half aged over 65). The men in our sample had few illnesses (M = 2.8 illnesses per person), had a
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Table 1 Descriptive statistics for men (N = 156) Variables
M
SD
Range
Maximum
CONCERN NCS BEHAVE1 BEHAVE2 PERRISK WORRY NILL AVSN UTSN SATSN NACS DEPRES
4.2 1.7 5.9 4.1 1.5 25.5 2.8 9.6 5.0 4.0 1.8 11.1
2.92 2.79 4.20 2.75 1.76 20.92 2.03 1.81 1.18 0.97 1.53 0.20
0–10 0–16 0–25 0–11 0–6 0–110 0–9 3–12 0–6 0–5 0–8 4–20
10 24 30 14 10 160 34 13 8 5 20 30
CONCERN: concern about crime in general; NCS: walking worry about crime; BEHA1: general behavioural precautions; BEHA2: home behavioural precautions; PERRIS: perception of victimization risk; WORRY: worry about victimization; NILL: number of illnesses; AVSN: availability of social network.; UTSN: utilization of social network; SATSN: satisfaction with social network; NACS: number of criminal acts suffered; DEPRES: depression.
satisfactory social network (63.2%), reported one or several victimizations of criminal acts (79.6%), and did not suffer from depressive symptoms (93.5%). According to ANOVA results, only two scales of the WAV presented differences as a function of age of the participants. These were the NCS (F(1,2) = 6.52, p b 0.01), covering, among other things, being accompanied for walks in the day or the night outside the home; and BEHAVE1 (F(1,2) = 3.97, p b 0.05), concerning the use of means of avoidance and protection. However, the post hoc tests (multiple comparisons with the Bonferroni test) did not reveal significant differences between age groups for BEHAVE1 (60–65 years = 5.02, 70–75 = 6.59, over 80 = 7.37, respectively; p = n.s.). For the NCS, only the 60–69 year old group differed from the other two groups. In effect, the young–old were less worried about crime while outside of the home (M = 0.96, SD = 1.86, p b 0.01) than the old (70– 79 years, M = 2.35, SD = 3.13, p b 0.01), and much less than the very old (80 years and over, M = 2.83, SD = 3.80, p b 0.01). The mean of worries while outside the home by the young–old was minimally elevated in comparison with the other age groups (M = 0.96, 2.35, 2.83 respectively). According to this scale, there was an increase in the sentiment of insecurity beginning at age 70. The researchers performed linear regression analyses to identify the variables associated with each of the six WAV scales. Only the independent variables with a p b 0.25 were retained for multiple logistic regression modelling. Of the 12 original predictor variables, only seven (age, education, cohabitation, previous victimization, co-morbidity, availability, and satisfaction with social network) were, according to these criteria, associated with one or the other dependant variables of the Worry About Victimization. We employed multiple logistic regression modelling to determine the associations among the six WAV scales (considered as dependant variables) and the predictor variables. Results are presented with scales grouped by dimension (see Table 2). Emotional dimension We observed significant results for the two scales of the emotional dimension. Four variables were significantly associated with CONCERN: education, previous victimization experience, the presence of illnesses, and the availability of the social network. More precisely, this analysis showed that men with less than 13 years of education had nearly three times the risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime, in general, than those with more education. Those who were previously victimized were eight times more likely than the non-victimized to worry or be preoccupied. Men with two or more chronic illnesses had four times the risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime in general than those with good health or only one illness. A rather surprising result was that a large available social network was associated with an increased risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime. Three variables were significantly associated with the NCS: age, presence of illnesses and the availability of the social network. Thus, with age, the fear of walking in one's neighbourhood day or night increases: the men aged
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Table 2 Odds ratio adjusted for four scales of WAV distributed across three dimensions (N = 156) Variables
Age (60–69 old) Education (14 years N) Family life Victimized (no) Illness (0 or 1) Availability (important) Satisfaction (important)
Category
70–79 old 80 & + b13 years Live alone Victim 2N Poor Poor
Emotional
Behavioural
Cognitive
CONCERN
NCS
BEHAVE1
PERRISK
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
– – 2.79⁎ 1.28 7.50⁎ 4.15⁎⁎ 0.05⁎ 3.16
– – 1.15–6.76 0.28–5.80 1.65–34.03 1.40–12.33 0.03–0.73 1.19–8.40
3.06⁎⁎ 4.59⁎⁎ – 2.88 – 2.88⁎ 4.64⁎ –
1.22–7.73 1.46–14.45 – 0.32–3.99 – 0.99–8.36 1.09–19.72 –
2.05 2.76 – 4.70⁎ 8.31⁎ – 0.73 –
0.73–5.77 0.72–10.60 – 1.23–17.94 1.24–55.57 – 0.16–3.35 –
– – 1.83 – 2.66 3.15⁎ – 2.20
– – 0.83–4.02 – 0.85–8.34 1.21–8.19 – 0.94–5.13
⁎ p b 0.05; ⁎⁎ p b 0.01. – variable not included in this model. CONCERN: concern about crime in general; Education: number of years of schooling completed; NCS: walking worry about crime; Family life: life with a family member; BEHAVE1: general behavioural precautions; Victimized: number of criminal acts suffered; PERRISK: perception of victimization risk; Illness number of illnesses; Age: age category; Availability: availability of social network; Satisfaction: satisfaction with social network.
70–79 had three times the risk of having such a fear as the men aged 60 to 69, while the men aged 80 and over had five times the risk. We also saw that the men with two or more chronic illnesses had three times the risk of being worried about crime while outside of the home than those with one or no illnesses. Finally, the men with a weakly available social network had five times the risk of being worried about crime while outside of the home day or night. Behavioural dimension For BEHAVE1, only cohabitation and previous victimization were significant. Thus, while outside of the home, to avoid being victims, the men who lived alone had five times more probability to take precautions as those living with one or more other family members. Such precaution might include planning a route to avoid dangerous places, or calling back to say that they arrived safely at home. Those who were previously victimized had eight times the risk of adopting these behaviours. BEHAVE2 evaluates protective measures used at home. None of the independent variables considered were associated with this variable. Cognitive dimension Only one variable is associated with PERRISK: chronic illnesses. The men with more than two illnesses perceived themselves as having a risk of being victim of a crime in the next year three times that of the men with one or no illnesses. None of the variables considered in this study were associated with WORRY, which evaluates the probability of being a victim of different specific crimes in the next year. 6. Discussion The fear of crime among the elderly has been studied a great deal by social gerontologists (Acierno, Rheingold, Resnick, & Kilpatrick, 2004; Beaulieu et al., 2003; Chadee & Ditton, 2003; DeDonder, Verté, & Messelis, 2005; Ferraro & LaGrange, 1988). However, since the fear of crime has been identified as belonging to women, men were often neglected in these studies. It remains that men also experience a certain fear of crime. Thus, despite the fact that fear of crime has often been identified as feminine; the goal of the present study was to identify, in Quebec, among men over 60 years, the variables that best predict the risk of having worry about victimization: a re-conceptualization of fear of crime. In doing so, we paid particular attention to divisions by age group and to different dimensions that define worry about crime (cognition, emotion and behaviour).
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According to the results, only worry about the possibility of walking alone in the neighbourhood during the day or night (emotional dimension) differs according to age group. This worry affects men more as they age, especially after age 70. However, there is no significant difference by age groups to see one's self as more or less at risk of being victim of a crime (cognitive dimension), or for the predisposition to adopt protective behaviours and to take precautions against crime (behavioural dimension). The emotional aspect, though, seems to constitute a determining factor in the explanation of the differences between groups of elderly men. In logistic regression, when we control the effects of other independent variables (cohabitation, co-morbidity, and available social network), this difference between age groups holds. In effect, the men aged 80 years or over had five times the risk of expressing a worry about the possibility of walking alone in their neighbourhood day or night than the individuals in the group 60–69 years. In terms of being more or less worried to walk alone in the day or at night in one's neighbourhood, which represents the emotional dimension of worry about crime, age is the most significant predictor variable. The presence of multiple chronic illnesses, indicator of increased physical fragility, also explains this worry. Other factors such as co-morbidity should then be taken into consideration to explain this worry in future research. The emotional dimension was measured by two scales. The second, more general scale consisted of asking the person if they were preoccupied by crime in general. Several factors increase the risk of experiencing such fear, thus accentuating the sentiment of vulnerability among men. Having an education level less than 13 years, having previously been a victim of one or more crimes, suffering from two or more chronic illnesses, and having an available social network emotionally weakens elderly men in regards to crime, whatever their age. The results concerning the social network are contrary to those of Smith et al. (2000). According to these authors, the lack of social support augments the perception of worry (emotional dimension) and the perception of risk of worry (cognitive dimension) about crime. In other words, according to them, there is an increase in the fear of being a victim when the social network is not very present; something that our results did not support. On the other hand, our results on previous victimization are partially corroborated by those of Smith and Torstensson (1997), who affirm that “there is some evidence, however, that age and prior injury still predict fear for men” (p.628). As for the behavioural dimension, it is interesting to observe that the precautions taken for activities outside the home are associated with living alone (five times the risk as those living with one or more family members) and having previously been victim of crime (eight times the risk as those who were never victims). These factors seem to greatly affect elderly men and their habits. Thus, those who live alone or were previously victims of crime are more inclined to adopt measures of protection, such as carrying something to protect themselves when they go out; and, of course, to avoid walking in certain areas judged to be dangerous. The cognitive dimension, operationalized in this study as the person's perception or evaluation of their probability of being victim of a crime during the next year, was only associated with the presence of several illnesses. Having more than two illnesses tripled the risk of considering that one would probably be victim of a crime. The analyses of results along different dimensions of worry about criminal victimization highlight the finding that, among elderly men, whatever their age group, several variables predict the risk of having a certain worry. However, these variables differ according to what we consider as emotional experience: behaviours adopted to guard against crime, or the evaluation of the risk of being victim of a crime. Therefore, the use of the social network, and the satisfaction with it, does not contribute to the explanation of worry about crime. Only the availability of the social network is associated with one of the dimensions: the emotional dimension. A lesser availability of the members of the network increases the probability of expressing worry about crime in general, while at the same time reducing the probability of expressing worry about crime while walking in the neighbourhood. Living alone greatly increases the probability of adopting protective behaviours and of taking precautions to guard against crime while outside the home. Lack of contact with significant others seems to accentuate worry felt while outside the home. We could potentially explain this association by the preoccupations that men have regarding strangers they meet. There needs to be more research in the direction of fear of strangers (i.e. the study by Ginsberg, 1985). Another observation may seem a bit surprising: Depressive sentiments, as measured by the Geriatric Depression Scale, did not seem to affect worry about criminal victimization among our participants. However, only a small percentage reported such sentiments, which could explain the result. Physical health, however, plays a preponderant role, with two aspects. The emotional aspect is seen in worry about crime in general, as well as worry about walking alone during the day or night. The cognitive aspect relates to the probability of being a victim. In this sample, having
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more than two illnesses increased by four times the risk of being preoccupied by crime in general, tripled the worry about walking alone in the neighbourhood, and tripled the risk of considering very likely the possibility of being victim of a crime. The participants were asked whether their worry about walking alone resulted from worry about crime or from another concern. Only the worries about crime were considered here. Thus, elderly men with more than two chronic illnesses may estimate themselves as being more vulnerable than their more healthy colleagues; given their lower capacity to defend themselves against an aggressor (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005). Physical health, the social network, and living alone or with family affect the emotional, cognitive, and behavioural dimensions of worry about crime. Previous victimization is not without consequence for elderly men. Whatever their age, those who have lived through such an event reported much higher probabilities of being worried or preoccupied by crime in general, to adopt protective behaviours, and to take precautions when going out to avoid another victimization. This might be explained by the fact that the elderly have reason to be prudent, as they are, or feel that they are, more vulnerable (physical vulnerability due to greater difficulties to defend themselves, to get away, or to recuperate from a victimization) than younger individuals (Greve, 1998). Another explanatory factor to consider here is the social construct of masculinity: an important factor for men's health (WHO, 2001). The socialization of men still contributes according to their great importance to physical abilities such as fighting, taking punches, ability to flee; and to the role of protector that they play for women and children (Smith & Torstensson, 1997). In fact, since childhood, a man has been conditioned by industrialized society to endorse his masculine role by controlling the expression of most of his emotions (Moss & Moss, 2007). However, in growing older, he increasingly expresses more emotions of insecurity that translate into worry about walking in the day or night in the neighbourhood. According to Spector-Mercel's (2006) thesis, our study shows that men can be both a “true” man and an old person, and that they experience issues associated with old age; such as a certain perceived vulnerability in certain dimensions of their lives. Smith et al. (2000) also observed this worry (emotional dimension), and deduced that the sentiment of vulnerability among elderly men approaches that of younger women. In their study, elderly men expressed a high level of fear; more than women in general. Observing that worry about crime among women diminishes with age, Haynie (1998) also arrives at essentially comparable results. Worry about crime, then, increases gradually over time among men, while diminishing among women. According to our results, this increase of fear is principally attributable to a worry about walking in the day or night in the neighbourhood. These results lead us to propose that future studies take into account the life span in order to understand variations in worry for both women and older men. We can then hypothesize that men abandon their social roles with age and are willing to respond positively to questions about their emotions (Moss & Moss, 2007). We can also question the source of worry about walking alone: is it a worry about crime or a worry attributable to other factors such as diminished vision, or other characteristics of aging? This theme should be elaborated in future research. Qualitative research is also necessary in order to better understand the impact of social roles, social networks, and health on worry about crime among men; as well as to capture the different ways, or the different words, in which men will address the three dimensions of worry about victimization. 7. Conclusion Ortega and Myles (1987) stated that the sentiment of vulnerability in the face of crime constitutes an experience relatively new for men. Twenty years later, there are still few studies on worry about victimization among men, especially taking into account the effect of advancing age. Is it still considered as being too new? Is it still a taboo? This lack of strong research can be interpreted as an invitation to continue to work on this theme. Even if, for many researchers, worry about crime constitutes a theme almost uniquely feminine, we are now convinced that men can be more and more vulnerable, at least emotionally, as they age. As well, the theory of vulnerability and the fact that men tend to deny their fears — perhaps because of social desirability — are also two hypotheses that merit further attention. Acknowledgements The authors wish to thank Marty Paterson for his quality of work and contribution to adapting this text to English. They also thank Enguerran Macia for his contribution to some of the analysis.
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Journal of Aging Studies 21 (2007) 336 – 346 www.elsevier.com/locate/jaging
Are elderly men worried about crime? Marie Beaulieu a,⁎, Micheline Dubé b , Christian Bergeron c , Marie-Marthe Cousineau d a
Université de Sherbrooke, Department of Social Work and Research Center on Aging, Health and Social Services Center — University Institute of Geriatrics of Sherbrooke, 1036, Belvedere South, Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada J1H 4C4 b Department of Psychology, University of Québec at Trois-Rivières (UQTR), Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada G9A 5H7 c Research Center on Aging, Health and Social Services Center — University Institute of Geriatrics of Sherbrooke, Canada d School of Criminology, University of Montreal, International Center of Compared Criminology, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3C 3J7 Received 2 March 2007; received in revised form 2 May 2007; accepted 27 May 2007
Abstract It has been well documented that older adults, especially women, are more inclined to express fear of crime, but their risk of victimization is significantly lower than for people from other age groups. Even if gender issues related to fear are known, fear of crime among men is undocumented. This article explores how worry about victimization among older men (N = 156), from 3 francophone cities in Quebec, Canada, is influenced by age groups (60–69, 70–79 and 80 years old and over), health, depression, social support and prior victimization. There are significant results associated with the 3 dimensions of worry about crime (emotional, behavioural and cognitive). We conclude by commenting on the following question: Is worry about crime among elderly men a reality? © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Keywords: Gender; Men; Fear of crime; Worry about victimization; Elderly
1. Introduction The field of masculinity has rapidly evolved during the last decade. Many issues have been covered, such as: masculine identity development in school, gender relationships, pornographic use, etc. Seidler (2006) states that masculinity theories have emerged in part as response to both the radical feminist discourse, and to men who have adopted a “pro-feminist” approach. These theories have not given place to men's emotions and experiences. Certain authors, such as Weeks (2005), argue that research should not dichotomize men's and women's issues; while many others plead for studies done specifically with men in order to better understand their social and personal identities. The field of masculinity is also emerging in social gerontology. There appears to be a tendency in social research to promote a life course or life span approach to better capture the essence of aging and masculinity. In a context where older men are often invisible, there is an explicit need to understand aging men's issues (Fleming, 1999; Kosberg & ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 819 8211170x2270; fax: +1 819 829 7141. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Beaulieu), [email protected] (M. Dubé), [email protected] (C. Bergeron), [email protected] (M.-M. Cousineau). 0890-4065/$ - see front matter © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jaging.2007.05.001
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Mangum, 2002; Spector-Mercel, 2006). According to Spector-Mercel, Western hegemonic masculinity scripts have been: doubly truncated: first, as gendered scripts, and second, as masculine scripts. The ageist spiral that “covers” gender statuses with the domineering “old” label, together with the images of older men as invisible, unmasculine and a paradoxical social category, make it culturally unfeasible to be both a “true” man and an old person (2006, p. 78). There are major gaps in knowledge concerning older men, such as social participation (Thompson & Whearty, 2004), impact of disability (Fleming, 1999), men's rights (Kosberg & Mangum, 2002), older male's heterosexual life (Kosberg, 2002), etc. In this respect, not much is known regarding more personal and social vulnerability aspects of older men's lives; such as victimization, sense of frailty, insecurity, or fear of crime. Fear of crime emerged as a research domain in the 1960s (Lee, 2001). Since then, it has been a continuous preoccupation on the part of researchers, interveners, political decision-makers (Possamaï & Murray, 2004), and mass media (Lee, 2001). Research results affirm that the elderly (Chadee & Ditton, 2003), especially elderly women (Keane, 1992; Ortega & Myles, 1987), manifest the most fear of crime, even if statistically they are part of the group the least at risk of being victimized (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005; Jackson, 2004; Possamaï & Murray, 2004). This phenomenon is now known as “the fear of victimization paradox” (Hale, 1996). In 1988, Ferraro and LaGrange published, in this journal, an article entitled: “Are Older People Afraid of Crime?” The authors concluded that the fear of crime among the elderly requires more research in order to better understand this paradox. Researchers have advanced several explanations concerning the prevalence, causes, and consequences of fear of crime among the elderly. Besides age and sex, research suggests that this fear could also be related to certain sociodemographic variables such as size of city, race, income, education, and marital status (Haynie, 1998; also for a review of literature see Hale, 1996). Above all, the vulnerability of women in general, and especially that of elderly women, has often been associated with a higher fear of crime. The perception that women are more affected by the fear of crime than men seems to be well anchored; and has been, at the end of the day, the object of little questioning. In the last few years, researchers have made progress to better understand men in general (Moss & Moss, 2007), but only a few rare studies have been interested particularly in the fear of crime among men. Those which have (e.g., Haynie, 1998; Schafer, Huebner, & Bynum, 2006) concluded that, in effect, elderly men manifest a certain fear of crime; but these studies only evaluated gender differences. It remains to examine more precisely how the fear of crime manifests uniquely among elderly men. 2. Background Statistics on the prevalence of fear of crime have not really changed since the 1970s (Roberts, 2001). Depending on the type of data analysed, between 27% and 43% of the elderly are affected by fear of crime in Canada (Beaulieu, Leclerc, & Dubé, 2003; Roberts, 2001). As background information, four elements appear to us as central to this subject: fear of crime, perceived vulnerability with advanced age, the influence of past experiences of victimization, and the importance of analysis by gender. Worry about victimization What is fear of crime? Since the mid-90s, there has been a certain consensus that the fear of crime is composed of three dimensions: emotional, cognitive and behavioural (Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004; Williams, McShane, & Akers, 2000). However, most of the time each of these dimensions is measured specifically and analysed independently of the other two (Ferraro, 1995; Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004). The emotional dimension corresponds to an emotional evaluation of the fear of being victim of a criminal act (Rader, 2004). The emotional character of fear of crime manifests itself notably in response to statements about the sentiment of being afraid to walk alone day or night in one's neighbourhood (Hale, 1996). According to Greve (1998), this measure constitutes the best way to evaluate fear, as it possesses a strong emotional dimension. Yet this traditional question has been much criticized due to the fact that it may measure something other than fear of crime.
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The cognitive dimension evaluates the anticipated risk of being a victim of a criminal act (Gabriel & Greve, 2003; Rader, 2004). This allows the measurement of the probability of being victim of a series of specific crimes, as perceived by the person (Chadee & Ditton, 2003). The cognitive dimension contains two distinct aspects: The evaluation of the probability of being victim of a crime against the person, and that of being victim of a crime against property (Ferraro, 1995). The behavioural dimension makes reference to behaviours adopted to face possible victimization (Bergeron, Beaulieu, Dubé, & Cousineau, 2006). This includes behaviours of avoidance (not visiting certain places or people, staying home, etc.) and of protection (buying a gun, installing more secure locks on doors and windows, etc.) (Greve, 1998; Rader, 2004). Even though the literature tends to affirm that the comprehension of fear of crime should include these three dimensions, we found no definition that does. As well, given the great diversity of definitions of fear of crime, certain authors do not hesitate to qualify the expression fear of crime as unusable (Warr, 1984): an idea that is abstract and polysemous (Jackson, 2004). Consequently, Skogan (1987) suggests using the terms preoccupation and worry, rather than fear, given that fear refers more to an emotion. Our analysis of the existing literature leads us to conclude that it would be better to abandon the term fear for that of worry (Williams et al., 2000). We propose the following definition of worry about criminal victimization: A feeling expressed by avoidance or protection behaviours, an abstract fear when being in a perceived threatening environment, or a concrete evaluation of the risk of being a victim of a personal or personal-property attack. Vulnerability hypothesis as an explanation of fear of crime Generally, in the evaluation of physical and social vulnerability, the variables gender, age, race, income, level of education, marital status, and prior victimization are taken into consideration (Schafer et al., 2006). Personal vulnerability is determinant in the intensity of the sentiment of insecurity felt in the face of the eventuality of being a victim (Dittmann, 2005). Furthermore, the hypothesis of perceived vulnerability remains the best explanation of the gender gap in fear of crime (Smith, Torstensson, & Johansson, 2000). In other words, the variations in the sentiment of insecurity are explained by the structures of age and gender in a given society (Dittmann, 2005). Thus, the elderly and women of all ages estimate themselves to be more vulnerable than younger adults and men in general; given their low capacity to defend themselves against a perpetrator (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005). As well, women are more apt to perceive risk than their masculine counterparts (Smith & Torstensson, 1997). Aging men are less conscious of their increasing vulnerability and continue to see themselves as independent, active, and valuing privacy (Moss & Moss, 2007). This vision corresponds to cultural norms in industrialized societies: e.g., social roles, machismo and masculinity (WHO, 2001). Influence of an experience of victimization on fear of crime Some researchers affirm that past experiences of victimization could explain a person's worry and perceived risk of being a victim (Amerio & Roccato, 2005; Dittmann, 2005). For example, the victims of physical assault are more inclined afterwards to express worry and to perceive more risks than do people who were not victims of this form of aggression (Smith & Torstensson, 1997; Smith et al., 2000). Conversely, other studies reveal that people who were victimized do not express more worry than others about crime (Moore & Shepherd, 2006). The role of previous victimization, then, is not yet clearly established in the literature as an explanation of the advent of a man's or a woman's worry about crime. Is there a link between a type of past victimization and the fear of certain specific types of crime, whether or not they are identical to the past victimization? Necessity for an analysis of worry about crime by gender For a long time, gender has constituted the variable the most strongly associated with insecurity (Haynie, 1998). Wanting to explain why worry about crime seems to affect women more than men, regardless of age (e.g., Ferraro, 1995; Fattah & Sacco, 1989), certain authors suggest that results must be analysed while accounting for social desirability. Sutton and Farrall (2005) have, in effect, shown that men, more than women, feel a social pressure to repress the expression of fear. In other words, the masculine taboo dictates that a man does not express the sentiment of
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fear. Social roles related to being a man, measured with the aid of a social desirability scale, explain, in a valid way, the data related to worry about crime. Thus, men are responding in a socially desirable fashion (Sutton & Farrall, 2005): “… men who are most concerned with giving socially desirable responses, and who therefore score highest on lie scales, ought to report the least fear of crime. This negative correlation should not occur for women, or at least should be weaker, because female gender roles are not so prohibitive with regard to admitting these sorts of fears” (p. 214). This leads us to stipulate that fear of crime could be much more important for men than it appears to be according to the literature. These findings are corroborated by Goodey (1997). All this background information leads us to affirm the social and scientific pertinence of treating worry about crime among men specifically, while accounting for the three components (cognitive, emotional and behavioural). 3. Research objectives The objective of the current article is to develop a better comprehension of worry about victimization among elderly men 60 years of age and over in Quebec (Canada). This involves identifying the variables that best predict the risk of being troubled with this worry and seeing whether the same variables are implicated for each dimension (cognitive, emotional, behavioural). The predictor variables retained are age group, size of municipality (metropolis or mid-size city), level of education, type of lodging, prior victimization, health, depression, and social support. Particular attention was given to different age cohorts and to variables measuring, amongst other things, physical and social vulnerability. 4. Data and method The data for this study come from a multi-center research project on criminal insecurities among the elderly that was conducted by mail questionnaires in 2005 and 2006, in three cities (one large: Montréal, 1.8 million inhabitants; and two mid-size: Sherbrooke and Trois-Rivières, around 150 000 inhabitants) of Quebec (Canada). The project respects the ethical conduct for research involving humans, and has been approved by the Research Ethic Board of the Universities of Sherbrooke, Montréal, and Québec at Trois-Rivières. All respondents had agreed via phone to answer the questionnaire. In total, 387 elderly persons, ranging from 60 to 98 years of age (M = 73.9, SD = 8.2), participated in the study. The sample was stratified and the data corrected (variables: city, age and gender) using populational data from the last available census (Statistique Canada, 2001) before proceeding with statistical analyses. Participants Only data from the male respondents (N = 156) were retained for the current article. The majority of these lived in a metropolis (N = 137: 87.8%), while the remainder (N = 19: 12.2%) lived in two mid-sized cities. They were divided among three age groups (60–69 years = 78 persons, 70–79 = 56, 80 and over = 22). They had a mean age of 71.4 years (SD = 7.1), 12.4 years of education (SD = 4.5) and lived mostly in couples (70%), in a house (46%) or an apartment (40%), and 36% declared an annual family income of less than $40,000. They did not present cognitive problems (M = 20.5 of 22) according to an abridged telephone version of the MMSE (Roccaforte, Burke, Bayer, & Wengel, 1992). All were francophone. Instruments The dependent variable, worry about criminal victimization, was evaluated with the Worry About Victimization (WAV, Williams et al., 2000), translated, adapted, and validated for an elderly francophone population (Authors, unpublished). The French version presents essentially the same internal consistency (Alpha varies from 0.67 to 0.95) as the original (0.61 to 0.93) and a test–retest reliability of 0.70 to 0.90 over a two-week period. The WAV contains 67 questions for 9 scales. Only the six scales that evaluate the cognitive, emotional, and behavioural dimensions were retained for the current study. Two scales measured the emotional dimension. The National Crime Survey (NCS), or Walking Worry About Crime (NCS, 12 items), seeks to determine to what point the participant is preoccupied by crime. The typical question is: “Is
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there any area within four blocks of your home where you would be worried about walking (alone or with someone else)?” Concern About Crime in General (CONCERN) contains only one question, “How concerned are you about crime in general?”, to which the person responds on a scale from 0 (not worried) to 10 (very worried). We also used scales to measure the behavioural dimension. General Behavioural Precautions (BEHAVE1, 10 items) enumerates the precautions taken before going out to guard against the eventuality of victimization. These precautions include never walking alone, carrying a whistle, carrying a cell-phone, etc. The general response directive is: “Do you take any of these measures for safety against crime?” Home Behavioural Precautions (BEHAVE2, 14 items) evaluates the precautions taken by the person at home to protect against crime. These precautions include installing more locks on doors and windows, installing an alarm system, etc. The scale is introduced by the question: “Have you done any of these things around the house?”, and followed by a list of 14 types of precautions. Two scales evaluated the cognitive dimension, with scores ranging from 0 to 10, with 10 as highest chance. Perception of Victimization Risk (PERRISK) contains one question: “What do you think your chances are of being a victim of any type of crime during this coming year?” Worry About Victimization (WORRY, 16 items) asks: “How you feel about your chances of being a victim of any of these offences during this coming year?” Several instruments serve to measure the independent variables. In Prior Victimization, with a series of 20 statements of forms of victimization, the person indicates whether he was a victim of each type of crime at one time or another in his life. He also indicates his relationship with the aggressor (i.e. spouse, child, other member of the family, acquaintance, etc.). The abridged version (15 items) of the Geriatric Depression Scale (Yesavage et al., 1983), translated and validated in French (Bourque, Blanchard, & Vézina, 1991), measures the depressive state of an elderly individual. An adaptation of the Social Functioning scale, developed during the Older Adult Resources and Services project (OARS) by Fillenbaum and Smyer (1981), was done by our team. It serves to evaluate three dimensions of the social support network: availability, utilization, and perceived satisfaction. The French version of the physical section of the Multifunctional Assessment Questionnaire (MFAQ) was used to indicate physical health (Lefrançois, Leclerc, & Poulin, 1995). It was designed to evaluate limitations in activities of daily living attributable to illnesses of an elderly person. A questionnaire gathered sociodemographic data. Treatment of data To perform logistic regression analyses, we transformed the WAV scales results, considered here as dependant variables, into dummy variables where the value 1 represented men who reported the highest number of cognitions, emotions, or behaviours (i.e. at or above the 75th percentile). We also constructed dummy variables for the following independent variables: city (Montreal = 1), cohabitation (alone = 1), education (less than 13 years = 1), type of lodging (house = 1), prior victimization (victim = 1), co-morbidity (2 illnesses or more = 1), and the three social network scales (weak network = 1). Depression (absence, light and severe) and age (60–69, 70–79, 80 and older) appear as threechoice categorical variables. Analysis The analysis plan contains four steps: 1) description of results for the dependent and independent variables, 2) a comparative analysis of means with ANOVA and the Bonferroni post-hoc tests, 3) linear regression of the dependent and independent variables, using non-adjusted odds ratios to determine the variables to include in a logistic regression, 4) multiple logistic regression with adjusted odds ratio for each dependent variable to identify predictive models. 5. Results Table 1 presents means and standard deviations for the variables in the study other than those enumerated in the description of participants. Globally, the elderly men in our sample reported a moderate level of worry about victimization (4.2 on a scale of 0 to 10). They adopted certain behaviours such as avoidance (M = 5.9 out of a possible 30), or protection (M = 4.1 out of a possible 14). They saw themselves as having low risk of being victim of a crime (M = 25.5 on a scale of 0 to 160), and estimated their chances of being victim of a crime in the next year as low (M = 1.5, on a scale of 0 to 10). These means are lower than those reported by Williams et al. (2000) for a general population (2000 individuals, half aged over 65). The men in our sample had few illnesses (M = 2.8 illnesses per person), had a
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Table 1 Descriptive statistics for men (N = 156) Variables
M
SD
Range
Maximum
CONCERN NCS BEHAVE1 BEHAVE2 PERRISK WORRY NILL AVSN UTSN SATSN NACS DEPRES
4.2 1.7 5.9 4.1 1.5 25.5 2.8 9.6 5.0 4.0 1.8 11.1
2.92 2.79 4.20 2.75 1.76 20.92 2.03 1.81 1.18 0.97 1.53 0.20
0–10 0–16 0–25 0–11 0–6 0–110 0–9 3–12 0–6 0–5 0–8 4–20
10 24 30 14 10 160 34 13 8 5 20 30
CONCERN: concern about crime in general; NCS: walking worry about crime; BEHA1: general behavioural precautions; BEHA2: home behavioural precautions; PERRIS: perception of victimization risk; WORRY: worry about victimization; NILL: number of illnesses; AVSN: availability of social network.; UTSN: utilization of social network; SATSN: satisfaction with social network; NACS: number of criminal acts suffered; DEPRES: depression.
satisfactory social network (63.2%), reported one or several victimizations of criminal acts (79.6%), and did not suffer from depressive symptoms (93.5%). According to ANOVA results, only two scales of the WAV presented differences as a function of age of the participants. These were the NCS (F(1,2) = 6.52, p b 0.01), covering, among other things, being accompanied for walks in the day or the night outside the home; and BEHAVE1 (F(1,2) = 3.97, p b 0.05), concerning the use of means of avoidance and protection. However, the post hoc tests (multiple comparisons with the Bonferroni test) did not reveal significant differences between age groups for BEHAVE1 (60–65 years = 5.02, 70–75 = 6.59, over 80 = 7.37, respectively; p = n.s.). For the NCS, only the 60–69 year old group differed from the other two groups. In effect, the young–old were less worried about crime while outside of the home (M = 0.96, SD = 1.86, p b 0.01) than the old (70– 79 years, M = 2.35, SD = 3.13, p b 0.01), and much less than the very old (80 years and over, M = 2.83, SD = 3.80, p b 0.01). The mean of worries while outside the home by the young–old was minimally elevated in comparison with the other age groups (M = 0.96, 2.35, 2.83 respectively). According to this scale, there was an increase in the sentiment of insecurity beginning at age 70. The researchers performed linear regression analyses to identify the variables associated with each of the six WAV scales. Only the independent variables with a p b 0.25 were retained for multiple logistic regression modelling. Of the 12 original predictor variables, only seven (age, education, cohabitation, previous victimization, co-morbidity, availability, and satisfaction with social network) were, according to these criteria, associated with one or the other dependant variables of the Worry About Victimization. We employed multiple logistic regression modelling to determine the associations among the six WAV scales (considered as dependant variables) and the predictor variables. Results are presented with scales grouped by dimension (see Table 2). Emotional dimension We observed significant results for the two scales of the emotional dimension. Four variables were significantly associated with CONCERN: education, previous victimization experience, the presence of illnesses, and the availability of the social network. More precisely, this analysis showed that men with less than 13 years of education had nearly three times the risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime, in general, than those with more education. Those who were previously victimized were eight times more likely than the non-victimized to worry or be preoccupied. Men with two or more chronic illnesses had four times the risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime in general than those with good health or only one illness. A rather surprising result was that a large available social network was associated with an increased risk of being worried or preoccupied by crime. Three variables were significantly associated with the NCS: age, presence of illnesses and the availability of the social network. Thus, with age, the fear of walking in one's neighbourhood day or night increases: the men aged
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Table 2 Odds ratio adjusted for four scales of WAV distributed across three dimensions (N = 156) Variables
Age (60–69 old) Education (14 years N) Family life Victimized (no) Illness (0 or 1) Availability (important) Satisfaction (important)
Category
70–79 old 80 & + b13 years Live alone Victim 2N Poor Poor
Emotional
Behavioural
Cognitive
CONCERN
NCS
BEHAVE1
PERRISK
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
Odds ratio
IC for OR (95%)
– – 2.79⁎ 1.28 7.50⁎ 4.15⁎⁎ 0.05⁎ 3.16
– – 1.15–6.76 0.28–5.80 1.65–34.03 1.40–12.33 0.03–0.73 1.19–8.40
3.06⁎⁎ 4.59⁎⁎ – 2.88 – 2.88⁎ 4.64⁎ –
1.22–7.73 1.46–14.45 – 0.32–3.99 – 0.99–8.36 1.09–19.72 –
2.05 2.76 – 4.70⁎ 8.31⁎ – 0.73 –
0.73–5.77 0.72–10.60 – 1.23–17.94 1.24–55.57 – 0.16–3.35 –
– – 1.83 – 2.66 3.15⁎ – 2.20
– – 0.83–4.02 – 0.85–8.34 1.21–8.19 – 0.94–5.13
⁎ p b 0.05; ⁎⁎ p b 0.01. – variable not included in this model. CONCERN: concern about crime in general; Education: number of years of schooling completed; NCS: walking worry about crime; Family life: life with a family member; BEHAVE1: general behavioural precautions; Victimized: number of criminal acts suffered; PERRISK: perception of victimization risk; Illness number of illnesses; Age: age category; Availability: availability of social network; Satisfaction: satisfaction with social network.
70–79 had three times the risk of having such a fear as the men aged 60 to 69, while the men aged 80 and over had five times the risk. We also saw that the men with two or more chronic illnesses had three times the risk of being worried about crime while outside of the home than those with one or no illnesses. Finally, the men with a weakly available social network had five times the risk of being worried about crime while outside of the home day or night. Behavioural dimension For BEHAVE1, only cohabitation and previous victimization were significant. Thus, while outside of the home, to avoid being victims, the men who lived alone had five times more probability to take precautions as those living with one or more other family members. Such precaution might include planning a route to avoid dangerous places, or calling back to say that they arrived safely at home. Those who were previously victimized had eight times the risk of adopting these behaviours. BEHAVE2 evaluates protective measures used at home. None of the independent variables considered were associated with this variable. Cognitive dimension Only one variable is associated with PERRISK: chronic illnesses. The men with more than two illnesses perceived themselves as having a risk of being victim of a crime in the next year three times that of the men with one or no illnesses. None of the variables considered in this study were associated with WORRY, which evaluates the probability of being a victim of different specific crimes in the next year. 6. Discussion The fear of crime among the elderly has been studied a great deal by social gerontologists (Acierno, Rheingold, Resnick, & Kilpatrick, 2004; Beaulieu et al., 2003; Chadee & Ditton, 2003; DeDonder, Verté, & Messelis, 2005; Ferraro & LaGrange, 1988). However, since the fear of crime has been identified as belonging to women, men were often neglected in these studies. It remains that men also experience a certain fear of crime. Thus, despite the fact that fear of crime has often been identified as feminine; the goal of the present study was to identify, in Quebec, among men over 60 years, the variables that best predict the risk of having worry about victimization: a re-conceptualization of fear of crime. In doing so, we paid particular attention to divisions by age group and to different dimensions that define worry about crime (cognition, emotion and behaviour).
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According to the results, only worry about the possibility of walking alone in the neighbourhood during the day or night (emotional dimension) differs according to age group. This worry affects men more as they age, especially after age 70. However, there is no significant difference by age groups to see one's self as more or less at risk of being victim of a crime (cognitive dimension), or for the predisposition to adopt protective behaviours and to take precautions against crime (behavioural dimension). The emotional aspect, though, seems to constitute a determining factor in the explanation of the differences between groups of elderly men. In logistic regression, when we control the effects of other independent variables (cohabitation, co-morbidity, and available social network), this difference between age groups holds. In effect, the men aged 80 years or over had five times the risk of expressing a worry about the possibility of walking alone in their neighbourhood day or night than the individuals in the group 60–69 years. In terms of being more or less worried to walk alone in the day or at night in one's neighbourhood, which represents the emotional dimension of worry about crime, age is the most significant predictor variable. The presence of multiple chronic illnesses, indicator of increased physical fragility, also explains this worry. Other factors such as co-morbidity should then be taken into consideration to explain this worry in future research. The emotional dimension was measured by two scales. The second, more general scale consisted of asking the person if they were preoccupied by crime in general. Several factors increase the risk of experiencing such fear, thus accentuating the sentiment of vulnerability among men. Having an education level less than 13 years, having previously been a victim of one or more crimes, suffering from two or more chronic illnesses, and having an available social network emotionally weakens elderly men in regards to crime, whatever their age. The results concerning the social network are contrary to those of Smith et al. (2000). According to these authors, the lack of social support augments the perception of worry (emotional dimension) and the perception of risk of worry (cognitive dimension) about crime. In other words, according to them, there is an increase in the fear of being a victim when the social network is not very present; something that our results did not support. On the other hand, our results on previous victimization are partially corroborated by those of Smith and Torstensson (1997), who affirm that “there is some evidence, however, that age and prior injury still predict fear for men” (p.628). As for the behavioural dimension, it is interesting to observe that the precautions taken for activities outside the home are associated with living alone (five times the risk as those living with one or more family members) and having previously been victim of crime (eight times the risk as those who were never victims). These factors seem to greatly affect elderly men and their habits. Thus, those who live alone or were previously victims of crime are more inclined to adopt measures of protection, such as carrying something to protect themselves when they go out; and, of course, to avoid walking in certain areas judged to be dangerous. The cognitive dimension, operationalized in this study as the person's perception or evaluation of their probability of being victim of a crime during the next year, was only associated with the presence of several illnesses. Having more than two illnesses tripled the risk of considering that one would probably be victim of a crime. The analyses of results along different dimensions of worry about criminal victimization highlight the finding that, among elderly men, whatever their age group, several variables predict the risk of having a certain worry. However, these variables differ according to what we consider as emotional experience: behaviours adopted to guard against crime, or the evaluation of the risk of being victim of a crime. Therefore, the use of the social network, and the satisfaction with it, does not contribute to the explanation of worry about crime. Only the availability of the social network is associated with one of the dimensions: the emotional dimension. A lesser availability of the members of the network increases the probability of expressing worry about crime in general, while at the same time reducing the probability of expressing worry about crime while walking in the neighbourhood. Living alone greatly increases the probability of adopting protective behaviours and of taking precautions to guard against crime while outside the home. Lack of contact with significant others seems to accentuate worry felt while outside the home. We could potentially explain this association by the preoccupations that men have regarding strangers they meet. There needs to be more research in the direction of fear of strangers (i.e. the study by Ginsberg, 1985). Another observation may seem a bit surprising: Depressive sentiments, as measured by the Geriatric Depression Scale, did not seem to affect worry about criminal victimization among our participants. However, only a small percentage reported such sentiments, which could explain the result. Physical health, however, plays a preponderant role, with two aspects. The emotional aspect is seen in worry about crime in general, as well as worry about walking alone during the day or night. The cognitive aspect relates to the probability of being a victim. In this sample, having
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more than two illnesses increased by four times the risk of being preoccupied by crime in general, tripled the worry about walking alone in the neighbourhood, and tripled the risk of considering very likely the possibility of being victim of a crime. The participants were asked whether their worry about walking alone resulted from worry about crime or from another concern. Only the worries about crime were considered here. Thus, elderly men with more than two chronic illnesses may estimate themselves as being more vulnerable than their more healthy colleagues; given their lower capacity to defend themselves against an aggressor (Fetchenhauer & Buunk, 2005). Physical health, the social network, and living alone or with family affect the emotional, cognitive, and behavioural dimensions of worry about crime. Previous victimization is not without consequence for elderly men. Whatever their age, those who have lived through such an event reported much higher probabilities of being worried or preoccupied by crime in general, to adopt protective behaviours, and to take precautions when going out to avoid another victimization. This might be explained by the fact that the elderly have reason to be prudent, as they are, or feel that they are, more vulnerable (physical vulnerability due to greater difficulties to defend themselves, to get away, or to recuperate from a victimization) than younger individuals (Greve, 1998). Another explanatory factor to consider here is the social construct of masculinity: an important factor for men's health (WHO, 2001). The socialization of men still contributes according to their great importance to physical abilities such as fighting, taking punches, ability to flee; and to the role of protector that they play for women and children (Smith & Torstensson, 1997). In fact, since childhood, a man has been conditioned by industrialized society to endorse his masculine role by controlling the expression of most of his emotions (Moss & Moss, 2007). However, in growing older, he increasingly expresses more emotions of insecurity that translate into worry about walking in the day or night in the neighbourhood. According to Spector-Mercel's (2006) thesis, our study shows that men can be both a “true” man and an old person, and that they experience issues associated with old age; such as a certain perceived vulnerability in certain dimensions of their lives. Smith et al. (2000) also observed this worry (emotional dimension), and deduced that the sentiment of vulnerability among elderly men approaches that of younger women. In their study, elderly men expressed a high level of fear; more than women in general. Observing that worry about crime among women diminishes with age, Haynie (1998) also arrives at essentially comparable results. Worry about crime, then, increases gradually over time among men, while diminishing among women. According to our results, this increase of fear is principally attributable to a worry about walking in the day or night in the neighbourhood. These results lead us to propose that future studies take into account the life span in order to understand variations in worry for both women and older men. We can then hypothesize that men abandon their social roles with age and are willing to respond positively to questions about their emotions (Moss & Moss, 2007). We can also question the source of worry about walking alone: is it a worry about crime or a worry attributable to other factors such as diminished vision, or other characteristics of aging? This theme should be elaborated in future research. Qualitative research is also necessary in order to better understand the impact of social roles, social networks, and health on worry about crime among men; as well as to capture the different ways, or the different words, in which men will address the three dimensions of worry about victimization. 7. Conclusion Ortega and Myles (1987) stated that the sentiment of vulnerability in the face of crime constitutes an experience relatively new for men. Twenty years later, there are still few studies on worry about victimization among men, especially taking into account the effect of advancing age. Is it still considered as being too new? Is it still a taboo? This lack of strong research can be interpreted as an invitation to continue to work on this theme. Even if, for many researchers, worry about crime constitutes a theme almost uniquely feminine, we are now convinced that men can be more and more vulnerable, at least emotionally, as they age. As well, the theory of vulnerability and the fact that men tend to deny their fears — perhaps because of social desirability — are also two hypotheses that merit further attention. Acknowledgements The authors wish to thank Marty Paterson for his quality of work and contribution to adapting this text to English. They also thank Enguerran Macia for his contribution to some of the analysis.
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