Right place, right time? Making crime pattern theory time-specific

Sabine E. M. van Sleeuwen, Stijn Ruiter, Wouter Steenbeek

Research output: Contribution to JournalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Objectives: Crime pattern theory and the related empirical research have remained rather a-temporal, as if the timing of routine activities and crime plays no role. Building on previous geography of crime research, we extend crime pattern theory and propose that an offender’s spatial knowledge acquired during daily routine activities is not equally applicable to all times of day. Methods: We put this extended theory to a first empirical test by applying a discrete spatial choice model to detailed information from the Netherlands on 71 offences committed by 30 offenders collected through a unique online survey instrument. The offenders reported on their most important activity nodes and offence locations over the past year, as well as the specific times they regularly visited these locations. Results: The results show that almost 40% of the offences are committed within the neighbourhoods of offenders’ activity nodes, increasing to 85% when including first-, second- and third-order neighbourhoods. Though not statistically significant in our small sample, the results further suggest that offenders are more likely to commit crime in neighbourhoods they have regularly visited at the same time of day than in neighbourhoods they have regularly visited at different times of day. Conclusion: Our extension of crime pattern theory is only tentatively supported. We argue for replication research with larger samples before any firm conclusions are warranted.
Original languageEnglish
Article number2
JournalCrime Science
Volume10
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Dec 2021
Externally publishedYes

Funding

The authors would like to thank René Hesseling (The Hague Police) and Anne Mooij (North-Holland Police) of The Netherlands Police for providing suspect data from their respective police regions. The authors would also like to thank the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback on the original version of the article. The research leading to this study has received funding from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) under the Research Talent program (406–16–504 to S.v.S.).

FundersFunder number
Anne Mooij
Hague Police
North-Holland Police) of The Netherlands Police
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek406–16–504

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Right place, right time? Making crime pattern theory time-specific'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this