Additive and synergistic perceived risk of crime: A multilevel longitudinal study in Peru

Abstract

In Criminology, fear of crime has been by and large a more common object of study than perceived risk of crime. Both concepts seem to be highly related. After all, they share theories (LaGrange, Ferraro, and Supanic 1992), almost all of their predictors (Russo, Roccato, and Vieno 2010; Rountree and Land 1996), and one of the concepts is considered the cause and effect of the other (Ferraro and LaGrange 1987; Rountree and Land 1996; Russo, Roccato, and Vieno 2010). In the words of Warr (2000), perceived risk is similar to fear but behaves differently. Moreover, Chadee and Ditton (2007) reported a positive correlation between perceived risk and fear of crime in a sample of 26 pairs of crimes. However, the correlation was small and variable (between 0.04 and 0.21), which the authors considered to be a sign of their independence rather than a hypothesis of their actual relationship.