Examining the (Dis)Agreement between Etiology and Consequences of Adults’ and Youths’ Perceptions of Collective Efficacy in Boston

• Author: Riley Tucker,Jacob I. Stowell,Gregory M. Zimmerman,David Squier Jones
• DOI: 10.1177/0022427819859638
• Date: 01 November 2019
• Published date: 01 November 2019
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Examining the

(Dis)Agreement

between Etiology

and Consequences

of Adults’ and Youths’

Perceptions of Collective

Efficacy in Boston

Riley Tucker

1

, Gregory M. Zimmerman

1

,

Jacob I. Stowell

1

, and David Squier Jones

2

Abstract

Objectives: To examine the extent to which adults’ and youths’ perceptions

of collective efficacy align, the shared and unique correlates of adults’ and

youths’ perceptions, and the effects of adults’ and youths’ perceptions on

youths’ violence. Method: Descriptive analysis, hierarchical linear modeling,

and spatial analysis analyze 1,636 youths from the 2008 Boston Youth

Survey and 1,677 adults distributed across 85 neighborhoods from the

2008 Boston Neighborhood Study. Results: Descriptive analysis indicates

that Boston adults’ and youths’ perceptions are largely divergent. Spatial

analysis indicates that there is not clustering of either adults’ or youths’

perceptions across Boston neighborhoods. Multilevel models indicate that

1

School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Northeastern University, Boston, MA, USA

2

Center for Homicide Research, Minneapolis, MN, USA

Corresponding Author:

Gregory M. Zimmerman, School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Northeastern Univer-

sity, 417 Churchill Hall, 360 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115, USA.

Email: g.zimmerman@northeastern.edu

Journal of Research in Crime and

Delinquency

2019, Vol. 56(6) 888-936

ªThe Author(s) 2019

Article reuse guidelines:

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DOI: 10.1177/0022427819859638

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adults’ and youths’ perceptions exhibit divergent etiology: Adults’ percep-

tions align closely with neighborhood collective efficacy and with their own

neighborhood perceptions, while youths’ perceptions are largely a function

of individual differences (race and age) and sociobehavioral factors (social

support and educational expectations). Youths’ perceptions of collective

efficacy, rather than aggregated adults’ perceptions of collective efficacy, are

inversely associated with youths’ violence. Conclusions: Adults’ and youths’

perceptions of collective efficacy represent distinct constructs. Research

should focus on the divergent processes through which adults’ and youths’

perceptions are generated and the differential effects of adults’ and youths’

perceptions on youths’ behaviors.

Keywords

collective efficacy, neighborhood effects, hierarchical linear models, spatial

analysis

Collective efficacy is a mainstay i n the neighborhood effects literatur e.

Referred to in criminology and sociology as the mobilization of community

resource potential to maintain public order, collective efficacy is theorized

to impede crime independent of the demographic composition and network

organization of the neighborhood (Sampson, Raudenbush, and Earls 1997).

Since its conceptualization, research has demonstrated that collective effi-

cacy is inversely associated with neighborhood-level violence (Ahern et al.

2013; Morenoff, Sampson, and Raudenbush 2001; Sampson 2006; Wik-

stro¨m 2012), individual crime and delinquency (Sampson, Morenoff, and

Gannon-Rowley 2002; Simons et al. 2005), and poor physical (Browning

and Cagney 2002) and mental health outcomes (Ahern and Galea 2011;

Franzini et al. 2005; Maimon, Browning, and Brooks-Gunn 2010; Morenoff

2003). Particularly among children, adolescents, and young adults, neigh-

borhood collective efficacy is generally considered a salient contextual

correlate of a range of psychosocial outcomes.

Although collective efficacy theory, at its core, exhibits a methodologi-

cal holism through which collective efficacy at the macro-level influences

crime rates at the macro-level, much of the research on collective efficacy

has adopted a methodological individualism through which macr o-level

factors can influence, and can be influenced by, microlevel factors (see

Coleman 1986; Parsons 1937). Accordingly, research has investigated sev-

eral causal mechanisms—direct, mediating, and moderating—through

Tucker et al. 889

which collective efficacy at the neighborhood level may impact individual-

level outcomes. Perhaps most notably, neighborho od collective efficacy

may impact individual variation in sociobehavioral outcomes through indi-

viduals’ perceptions of and reactions to their neighborhood settings (Hard-

ing 2009, 2010; Sharkey 2006; Wilson 1987). As Sharkey (2006:829) notes,

“the effects of social environments on individual behavior are at least

partially mediated by internal cognitive processes.”

There are several challenges, however, to studying this macro-to-micro

relational process. For one, collective efficacy is typically measured at

the neighborhood level by aggregating adult residents’ perceptions/

responses (Sampson et al. 1997). As there is no official or observational

measure of neighborhood collective efficacy independent of adult resi-

dents’ perceptions, measures of neighborhood collective efficacy are sub-

ject to the shortcomings of surveys, including selection bias.

Additionally, existing literature has demonstrated that there is often a

significant gap between parents’ and youth s’ perceptions with respect

to several issues. For example, differences exist between parents’ and

youths’ reports of youths’ symptomatology (see De Los Reyes and Kaz-

din 2005), family conflict (Paikoff, Carlton-Ford, and Brooks-Gunn

1993), parental involvement in the child’s peer relationships (Mounts

2007), and negative life events such as exposure to community violence

(Howard et al. 1999). These reporting discrepancies raise several issues,

including which reporter is most accurate, what is the cause of perceptual

discord, and which report most strongly predicts youths’ outcomes

(Byrnes et al. 2007; S. C. Duncan, Duncan, and Strycker 2002).

With respect to the connection between neighborhood collective efficacy

and youths’ developmental outcomes, agreement between adults’ and

youths’ perceptions of collecti ve efficacy is paramount. Disc ord in this

sense raises questions about (1) the link between neighborhood collective

efficacy, as measured via the aggregated responses of adults’ self-reports,

and youths’ perceptions of collective efficacy and ultimately (2) the utility

of neighborhood collective efficacy for youths’ developmental outcomes.

Given the emphasis that prior research has placed on the inverse relation-

ship between neighborhood collective efficacy and youths’ externalizing

behaviors (Ichikawa, Fujiwara, and Kawachi 2017; Maimon and Browning

2010; Molnar et al. 2004; Sampson 1997; Sampson et al. 2002), variation

between youths’ and adults’ perceptions of collective efficacy (in the same

community) muddies the hypothesized pathways through which collective

efficacy deters youth violence and delinquency. Moreover, it is possible that

youths’ expectations about informal social control via local adults will have

890 Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 56(6)