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A Reassessment of the Association Between Social Disorganization and Youth Violence in Rural Areas
Author(s) -
Kaylen Maria T.,
Pridemore William Alex
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
social science quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.482
H-Index - 90
eISSN - 1540-6237
pISSN - 0038-4941
DOI - 10.1111/j.1540-6237.2011.00808.x
Subject(s) - rural area , demography , psychology , association (psychology) , criminology , socioeconomics , geography , demographic economics , sociology , political science , economics , law , psychotherapist
Objective To study the association between social disorganization and youth violence rates in rural communities. Method We employed rural M issouri counties ( N = 106) as units of analysis, measured serious violent victimization data via hospital records, and the same measures of social disorganization as O sgood and C hambers (2000). Controlling for spatial autocorrelation, the negative binomial estimator was used to estimate the effects of social disorganization on youth violence rates. Results Unlike O sgood and C hambers, we found only one of five social disorganization measures, the proportion of female‐headed households, to be associated with rural youth violent victimization rates. Conclusion Although most research on social disorganization theory has been undertaken on urban areas, a highly cited O sgood and C hambers (2000) study appeared to extend the generalizeability of social disorganization as an explanation of the distribution of youth violence to rural areas. Our results suggest otherwise. We provide several methodological and theoretical reasons why it may be too early to draw strong conclusions about the generalizeability of social disorganization to crime rates in rural communities.