Relationships between anxiety about crime and general trust: A comparison with optimistic view of criminal victimization

Abstract

This paper explores the relationships among reactions to crime, general trust, and optimistic view of criminal victimization through two surveys. A web-based survey of mothers (N=1040) with children aged 3–12 years and a paper-based questionnaire of female undergraduate students (N=216) were conducted to assess cognitive reactions to crime (cognition about the deterioration of security, perceived risk of victimization), emotional reactions to crime (anxiety about the deterioration of security, anxiety about crime), crime prevention behaviors, general trust, and optimistic view of criminal victimization. The results indicated the following. For both mothers and female students, (a) optimistic view of criminal victimization was negatively correlated with both cognitive and emotional reactions to crime and crime prevention behaviors. (b) Interestingly, however, despite the absence of a significant correlation between general trust and cognitive-emotional reactions to crime, a higher level of general trust led to an increased likelihood of adopting crime prevention behaviors.