The purpose of the current study is to examine whether a history of incarceration is associated with trajectories of self-reported vision among adults aged 55 years and older. Data were from the 2012–2022 Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative longitudinal cohort of older adults in the United States. The analytic sample included 8,347 respondents aged ≥ 55 years. Group-based trajectory modeling was used to identify longitudinal patterns in vision, and multinomial logistic regression was used to estimate associations between incarceration history and trajectory group membership. Three distinct vision trajectories emerged: Stable Good Vision (65.5
Association with deviant peers is a well-documented predictor of adolescent substance use. Far less attention, however, has been paid to how this relationship is embedded within the structural contexts that shape adolescents’ daily lives, particularly schools, where adolescents regularly interact face-to-face with peers. Leveraging variation in school return timing during the COVID-19 pandemic as a proxy for differences in in-person peer interaction, this study tests whether school return timing is indirectly associated with adolescent marijuana use through friends’ marijuana use and whether it moderates the association between friends’ marijuana use and adolescents’ own marijuana use. Analyses of statewide data from Florida middle and high school students in grades 6–12 (N = 7,656) provide limited evidence of mediation but clear evidence of moderation: friends’ marijuana use is more strongly related to adolescents’ own marijuana use among early returnees than among later returnees, particularly among adolescents with multiple marijuana-using friends. Findings suggest that schools should be understood not only as protective institutions but as structured social environments that organize adolescents’ in-person interactions with marijuana-using friends. Prevention efforts, therefore, may benefit from extending beyond individual-level education to the social settings in which such interactions occur, especially for adolescents with greater exposure to marijuana-using friends.
Most criminal justice administrative databases lack an identifier for veteran status. As a result, analyses of military veterans’ offending often use prison-based samples or rely upon self-identification, which can omit critical populations of veterans, confounding results. The lack of data hinders efforts to accurately estimate the prevalence of veteran offending and describe its contours, both of which are necessary to design responsive interventions. We build a more comprehensive picture of veterans and the criminal justice system by linking Pennsylvania sentencing records (2016-2021) to veteran status using administrative data from the VA. These data enable the comparison of demographic and offense characteristics of veterans and non-veterans. Veterans were older (with a unique bimodal age distribution), more likely to be male, and had less prior criminal history, particularly with regard to juvenile offenses. Veterans were disproportionately convicted of crimes against minors, danger to persons offenses, and DUIs, and they were underrepresented in drug and property offenses. We conclude by calling for more consistent and reliable identification of veterans in criminal justice data, particularly those used by researchers.
This study examines how routine digital media use shapes public blame attribution and prevention preferences following K-12 school shootings. Drawing on Mean World Syndrome (MWS) and research on doomscrolling, the study investigates whether habitual exposure to threatening and sensationalized content is associated with patterns of digital engagement and interpretations of responsibility for school shooting events. Using a nationwide survey of U.S. adults (N = 540), the study measured MWS, doomscrolling tendencies, political orientation, blame attribution, and engagement behaviors such as seeking information, sharing, and commenting on school violence–related content. Canonical correlation analyses indicate that higher levels of MWS and doomscrolling are associated with greater engagement across multiple digital media behaviors. In contrast, blame attribution is structured primarily by political ideology, with liberal respondents emphasizing gun policy and conservative respondents attributing responsibility to mental health and media influences. These findings suggest that while media-shaped worldviews influence how individuals engage with school shooting information, political ideology plays a dominant role in shaping public interpretations of responsibility and preferred prevention strategies. The study highlights how digital media environments contribute to the formation of public attitudes that influence criminal justice and school safety policy debates.
Cybercrime increasingly extends beyond purely digital environments into hybrid cyber-physical spaces, creating new risks for urban infrastructure, mobility systems, and everyday socioeconomic activities. While criminology has long emphasized the importance of place in shaping crime patterns, research on cybercrime often treats physical space as peripheral rather than integral. This study addresses this gap by systematically reviewing how cybercrime intersects with physical environments and how spatial perspectives can advance criminological understanding in the digital era. Following PRISMA guidelines, we examine peer-reviewed articles published between 2000 and 2025 in the Web of Science and Scopus using a combined bibliometric and critical review approach. The results indicate that scholarship explicitly linking cybercrime to physical space is emerging but remains limited. Existing studies primarily focus on virtual mechanisms and online interactions while under-examining spatial contexts and place-based processes. The review identifies transportation, energy, healthcare, and industrial systems as key physical domains where cyber risks intersect with critical infrastructures and routine activities. Across these domains, social, economic, technological, and policy conditions generate spatially differentiated patterns of exposure and impact. We identify five major research gaps, including the absence of multiscale spatial typologies, limited attention to built environment and mobility dynamics, weak integration of spatial thinking into prevention strategies, lack of GIS-based indicators and tools, and insufficient incorporation of cyber risks into urban resilience planning. These findings suggest the continuing importance of place in cybercrime and call for stronger integration of geographic perspectives, Geospatial AI (GeoAI), and cyber-physical system thinking within criminology and crime prevention research.
The long-term decline in homicide clearance rates has persisted even as homicide levels fluctuate, underscoring the need to better understand the forces that shape investigative outcomes and public engagement with the investigative process. While prior research has emphasized case characteristics, structural conditions, and police resources, less empirical attention has been given to how community members evaluate the fairness of homicide investigations and how these evaluations influence cooperation with law enforcement. Drawing on a community-engaged survey of 482 residents across five Chicago neighborhoods with high levels of firearm violence, this study examines whether perceptions of investigative fairness are associated with willingness to cooperate in homicide investigations. The survey instrument was co-developed with a Survivor Advisory Council of family members of homicide victims and captures perceived fairness across three domains: racial equity, age-based equity, and the treatment of victims perceived as gang-involved versus “innocent.” Using multinomial logistic regression models, we find that perceptions of unequal treatment are consistently associated with reduced willingness to cooperate, including calling the police after witnessing a homicide and providing information about suspects. Perceived racial unfairness emerges as the most robust predictor. These findings extend procedural justice and legal cynicism frameworks into the context of homicide investigations and highlight the role of perceived investigative equity in shaping community cooperation and investigative capacity.
The low self-control psychopathic traits scale (LSCPTS) represents an important advancement linking ‘antisocial core’ traits drawn from both criminology and psychology to deviant and risky behavior. The current study adds to the emergent literature utilizing this theoretical measure by investigating how it relates to risky behavior occurring within digital spaces. Drawing on survey data collected from a large sample of U.S. adults, we find that the LSCPTS and its constituent components are associated with an increased likelihood of Dark Web access, greater cyber victimization, and poorer cyber hygiene practices. In this manner, we extend the generality of the LSCPTS and the antisocial core to digital behaviors and outline avenues for future research.
Loneliness is a growing public health concern, particularly among older persons and U.S. military veterans, yet little is known about how specific life experiences contribute to persistent loneliness over time. This study examines whether a history of arrest is associated with loneliness patterns over time among low-income veterans. Using five waves (2021–2025) of data from the nationally representative NV-HOPE study (n = 674), group-based trajectory modeling identified four loneliness trajectories: no loneliness (22.8
Abundant prior research has shown that patterns of criminal sentencing often vary according to the characteristics of defendants and court communities, even under presumptive guidelines systems that are intended to reduce these inconsistencies and inequalities. Moreover, there is also some evidence that seemingly irrelevant events such as bad weather, the outcomes of local sporting events, and the clock change to daylight saving time can influence judicial decision-making and result in harsher punishments. Building on this body of work, the current study examines variation in sentencing severity by calendar date, with a specific focus on the possibility of increased leniency during Christmastime. Analyses of data on felony cases disposed in Minnesota district courts between 1991 and 2022 (N = 428,745) reveal that defendants who were sentenced on December 24, 26, and 27 were slightly more likely to receive a “stay of imposition”—a highly advantageous sanction in which the felony conviction is reduced to a misdemeanor upon successful completion of a probation term. Interpreted in light of the concepts of seasonal altruism and the “Scrooge effect,” these findings may suggest that the spirit of the Christmas season softens judges’ hearts and motivates the exercise of discretion.
Urban villages are widely presumed to be uniformly criminogenic, yet whether this characterization holds across different spatial contexts remains untested. This study uses geocoded crime data (2019–2021) at the 200 m grid level (N = 959 cells) from Futian District, Shenzhen, China, and employs Bayesian spatial panel models and spatially varying coefficient models to test three progressive hypotheses. Results indicate that crime exhibits significant spatial clustering, with nearly 70
There is a growing interest in the use of alternatives to traditional police enforcement for reducing traffic violations and crashes, which pose a substantial threat to public safety and impose considerable burdens on police resources. This study examines one such alternative involving the use of civilian auxiliaries (volunteers) to reduce traffic violations through high-visibility presence at locations with a high risk for vehicle crashes. Using a quasi-experimental design in two small cities in Utah, we examine speeding and traffic signal-stop sign violations at high-risk intersections when the locations were patrolled by uniformed civilians in marked vehicles as compared to when the same locations were patrolled by regular uniformed officers. Our results suggest that civilian volunteer patrols can be as effective as regular officers in deterring speeding and other traffic violations. Results from one of the cities also suggest that the effectiveness of civilian patrols can be enhanced when volunteers monitor speeding outside their vehicles and use flashing lights to enhance their visibility. The study highlights an approach to traffic control that may enhance traffic safety while conserving police resources and strengthening police-community collaboration.
Research consistently shows that crime and disorder are concentrated at a small number of micro-places, but most studies have explored this pattern only in large cities. As a result, it remains unclear whether similar spatial patterns characterize crime and disorder in suburban and rural communities. This study addresses this gap by assessing how police calls-for-service (CFS) are distributed across micro-places in suburban and rural jurisdictions of Hamilton County, Ohio. Using CFS data from 2020–2022, the analysis focuses on street blocks and intersections and evaluates spatial concentration using standard benchmarks, Lorenz curves, and Gini coefficients. The study also evaluates whether high-demand locations are driven by specific types of calls or by mixed call patterns. Results show that CFS are highly concentrated: about 1
This manuscript examines perceptions of personal safety among incarcerated people and correctional staff from five state prisons across the United States. We examine facilitators and inhibitors of perceptions of safety and explore the impacts of facility-related characteristics (e.g., length of time in the facility), job-related characteristics (e.g., staff security/nonsecurity roles), and background characteristics (e.g., race and gender) on perceptions of safety. Results indicate that age is a consistent facilitator of perceptions of safety among both incarcerated people and staff, with older individuals reporting higher feelings of safety than younger individuals. The main inhibitor of perceptions of safety for both incarcerated people and staff was how long they had served in the facility – with those spending more time in the facility reporting feeling significantly less safe. Finally, results indicated that demographic characteristics, particularly race, can be both inhibitors and facilitators of perceptions of safety, but may operate differently among incarcerated persons and staff.
Mass public shooting research has been hindered by inconsistencies in case definitions, limited behavioral data, and variation in methodological transparency across existing datasets. This short report introduces Sharing Information to Stop Mass Shootings (SISMS), a behavioral and event-level dataset designed to support research on mass public shootings in the United States. SISMS currently includes 171 incidents and 175 perpetrators occurring between 1999 and 2024 for which pre-attack warning behaviors or leakage were confirmed through available source materials and incorporates data derived from public records, official documents, and triangulated open-source reporting. In addition to demographic and incident characteristics, the dataset includes information related to grievances, concerning behaviors, planning and preparation, leakage, and other pre-attack indicators associated with pathways to intended violence. This report describes the dataset structure, inclusion criteria, source collection procedures, and presence-based coding methodology. Potential applications for research and violence prevention also are discussed.
Scholars have yet to adequately identify the county-level correlates of support for punitive criminal justice policy. Prior research has relied upon partisan politics, religious fundamentalist affiliation, and social threat perspectives to explain levels of punitiveness in many other U.S. jurisdictions. The current study applies these perspectives to assess the correlates of county-level support for crime policy in California. Data from multiple sources were employed to test which perspectives predicted voter support for eight ballot initiatives over a 30-year period. Results of fixed effects models suggest support for the partisan politics and economic threat perspectives, while other findings failed to support traditional fundamentalist and ethnic threat perspectives. Furthermore, property crime rates were associated with tough on crime voting, while the violent crime threat hypothesis was unsupported. Developing criminal justice policy that alters sanctions may draw varying levels of support across voters. Based on our findings, politicians should consider the partisanship, economic status, crime levels, and religious characteristics of their constituencies when advancing criminal justice policy.
Police managers play key roles in shaping conditions for frontline personnel. Consequently, the support they perceive from their supervisors and the organizations they serve may affect their work engagement and organizational commitment. Using survey data from middle- and upper-level police leaders from local and state law enforcement agencies, we explore the direct and indirect effects of interactional justice (IJ), perceived organizational support (POS), and work-focused self-efficacy (SE) on managers’ work engagement (WE) and affective organizational commitment (OC). Using structural equation modeling, we examine the direct effects of IJ, POS, and SE on WE and OC. We test the mediating effects of POS and SE on the IJ–OC relationship, the mediating effect of SE on the POS–OC relationship, and the relationships between IJ and POS and SE. The results suggest significant direct effects of POS and SE on OC. The direct effects of IJ on OC are nonsignificant and appear to be mediated by POS and SE, while both POS and IJ have a significant positive relationship with SE. These findings contribute to the understanding of police leaders’ OC and the roles of IJ and SE in policing contexts.
The recent rise in reported hate crimes in the United States is usually interpreted as evidence of increasing prejudice-driven aggression. An alternative explanation is that changes in reporting practices and data coverage have inflated hate crime counts. Using longitudinal data from the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) and the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS), we examine trends in hate crime severity by analyzing changes in the proportion of victims sustaining physical injury, net of comparable non-bias crime victim injury trends. Results show that the proportion of victims who suffered a physical injury in a hate crime has declined substantially over the study period, while injury levels in similar non-bias crimes have remained relatively stable. Hate crimes and non-hate crimes where victim injury is unlikely, such as destruction of property, also showed a marked increase over the study period. These findings are more consistent with instrumentation effects associated with expanded reporting and classification than with interpretations that attribute the rise solely to escalating bias-motivated violence. Although it is possible that other mechanisms, including shifts in the form of bias expression and changes in victim and agency reporting practices, may be concurrently operating.
This study examines whether neighborhood racial diversity buffers or amplifies anti-Black hate crime amid Black residential change in Los Angeles County. Prior research on defended neighborhoods and group threat focuses largely on Black-white dynamics, overlooking how multiracial contexts may reshape patterns of racialized targeting. Using geocoded anti-Black hate crime data from the Los Angeles County Commission on Human Relations (2011–2015) and census-derived measures of racial composition and change, I estimate a series of negative binomial spatial models to assess whether neighborhood diversity moderates the relationship between Black residential shifts and anti-Black hate crime. Results show that racially diverse “no majority” neighborhoods experience significantly fewer anti-Black hate crime incidents than less diverse contexts. While increased Black population change does not heighten anti-Black targeting in models assuming Black-white interaction, diversity exerts a moderating effect under alternative exposure structures, particularly those involving Black-Latino interactions. These patterns suggest that the mechanisms of racial threat and neighborhood defense vary across multiracial settings: in Los Angeles, Latino-majority minority neighborhoods appear more susceptible to anti-Black targeting during periods of demographic change, while more ethnically heterogeneous neighborhoods show consistent buffering effects. Overall, the findings extend the defended neighborhoods perspective by demonstrating that racial conflict and demographic threat are not confined to Black-white binaries but operate through broader multigroup dynamics shaped by local racial histories and neighborhood diversity.
A body of research has examined the consequences associated with being processed through the criminal justice system. The current study built upon this literature by examining whether probation and incarceration were differentially associated with health, economic, and behavioral outcomes. To do so, data drawn from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) were analyzed. The results of the analyses revealed that there was no association between whether a person was sentenced to probation or incarcerated and health problems, depression, economic disadvantage, job benefits, criminal involvement, and victimization. We discuss what these findings mean for criminal-justice policy and for discussions regarding the relative efficacy of incarceration and community-based corrections.
