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theses

One of the most important predictors of fear of crime is gender, in that women are more fearful of crime than men despite their lower risks for victimization. Given that crime on campus has become one of the nation’s most pressing social problems, it is important to investigate the impact of perceived risk and fear of crime on students’ routines, in addition to how these vary by gender and campus context. As such, this study aims to answer the following questions: First, how does the community context and the presence of the campus police shape women’s and men’s perceptions of risk and fears of victimization on campus? Second, how and when do gender and campus context influence students’ ideas about who the most likely victims and perpetrators of crime are? And third, how does the adoption of precautionary strategies impact women’s and men’s perceptions of risk and fear of victimization? Through analysis of in-depth interviews with 70 undergraduates at a suburban (N=36) and an urban university (N=34), this study challenges previous research attributing women’s higher levels of fear to the notion that their concerns about sexual assault “shadow” their fears of other crimes, regardless of campus context. Although the shadow was present in both women’s and men’s remarks on the suburban campus, such that nearly all participants explicitly related the limited concerns they had to the possibility of women being sexually assaulted by non-students, it was largely absent on the urban campus where all students instead noted being most concerned about robbery committed by residents of the city who were poor and African American. Further, and contrary to existing research, gender shaped the precautionary measures that students used to minimize their risks in the two settings in different ways. Overall, this study emphasizes the need to consider context when examining how gender influences students’ perceptions of risk and fear of crime on campus, particularly since it has been central to investigations of residents’ perceptions of risk and fear of crime within neighborhood settings. This study’s findings aim to inform policy discussions at institutions of higher education, as administrators and campus police departments attempt to make students feel safer while also ensuring that women and men have equal access to the opportunities that will make their futures successful.

ETD_8910

Ph.D.

Includes bibliographical references

by Shannon Kerry Jacobsen

doi:10.7282/T3SB4955

ETD doctoral

The author owns the copyright to this work.