The Impact of Changing Demographic Composition on Aggravated Assault Victimization During the Great American Crime Decline

• Author: Maria Kaylen,William Alex Pridemore,Sean Patrick Roche
• Published date: 01 September 2017
• DOI: 10.1177/0734016817724503
• Date: 01 September 2017
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

The Impact of Changing

Demographic Composition

on Aggravated Assault

Victimization During the

Great American Crime

Decline: A Counterfactual

Analysis of Rates in Urban,

Suburban, and Rural Areas

Maria Kaylen

1

, William Alex Pridemore

2

, and Sean Patrick Roche

3

Abstract

The United States experienced a dramatic decline in interpersonal violence rates between the early

1990s and mid-2000s. This decline, however, was much steeper in urban and suburban relative to

rural areas. Prior research showed changing demographic composition can account for a substantial

amount of change in inequality in victimization rates. We employed National Crime Victimization

Survey data and counterfactual modeling to determine if changes in demographic composition—

including proportion of population young, unmarried, male, unemployed, and in several income

groups—of urban, suburban, and rural areas were partially responsible for changes between 1993

and 2005 in (1) area-specific aggravated assault victimization rates and (2) urban–suburban, urban–

rural, and suburban–rural victimization rate ratios. Results showed changes in individual demo-

graphic characteristics played a very minor role in changes in area-specific assault rates. The one

exception was income, which explained a substantial amount of change in victimization rates across

all three areas. Changes in demographic composition explained a greater amount of change in rural

relative to urban and suburban victimization rates. Changes in demographic composition across

these three area types were also responsible for a small proportion of the large changes in the

urban–rural and suburban–rural victimization rate ratios over time.

1

Independent Scholar, Milwaukee, WI, USA

2

School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany—State University of New York, Albany, NY, USA

3

School of Criminal Justice, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX, USA

Corresponding Author:

William Alex Pridemore, School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany—State University of New York, 135 Western

Avenue, Albany, NY 12222, USA.

Email: pridemore@albany.edu

Criminal Justice Review

2017, Vol. 42(3) 291-314

ª2017 Georgia State University

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DOI: 10.1177/0734016817724503

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Keywords

rural crime, demographic composition, counterfactual analysis

Introduction

Urban violence rates are generally higher than suburban and rural violence, rates but the magnitude

of differences between them varies over time. During the great crime decline in the United States,

National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) data show that between 1993 and 2005 annual

aggravated assault victimization rates declined about 75%in urban and suburban areas but only

42%in rural areas. In 1993, urban and suburban aggravated assault v ictimization rates were,

respectively, 163%and 43%higher than rural rates. By 2005, however, the urban rate was only

18%higher than in rural areas, and the rural rate was 69%higher than suburban rates. Violence rates

declined markedly in all three areas, but rural residents benefitted substantially less than their urban

and suburban counterparts.

While there are several potential methodological and substantive explanations for these trends,

we explored whether changes in the demograp hic compositions of these three area types wer e

partially responsible for changes in rates of aggravated assault victimization rates. Following Tha-

cher’s (2004) substantive and methodological framework, we examined changes in area-specific

demographics and aggravated assault incident rates using NCVS data from 1993 to 2005. We then

determined the combined effects of demographic composition changes on violence rate changes via

counterfactual models. We also addressed whether demographic–victimization risk relationships

varied by community type.

Demographic Shifts and Crime Trends

There is an extensive history of linking crime rates to demographic characteristics. The

Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), for instance, publishes annual victimization rates of various

demographic groups by income, race, gender, home ownership, residence area type (i.e., rural,

suburban, or urban), and region of the United States (e.g., Truman & Morgan, 2016). Much of

this research is descriptive or cross-sectional, with few studies examining the effects of

temporal demographic changes on crime rates over time (Meier & Miethe, 1993; Thacher,

2004). Notable exceptions include Cohen and Felson (1979), Steffensmeier and Harer (1999),

Levitt (1999a, 1999b), and Thacher (2004), which focused on household activities (e.g.,

single-adult households and employment outside the home), age composition, or income

composition.

There is evidence that demographic changes affect crime rates. Cohen and Felson’s (1979)

examination of the impact of changes in age structure and household activities on predatory crime

rates post-World War II was a pivotal study of the effects of population composition changes on

crime. They found their household activities ratio was consistently positively associated with person

and property victimization rates. Steffensmeier and Harer (1999) found age composition had large

effects on national crime rates in the 1980s, but effects diminished through the mid-1990s. Levitt

(1999a) concluded that while the individual-level association between age and crime is strong, the

aggregate-level association between age composition and crime rates is limited. Levitt (1999b) also

found property crime victimization became increasingly concentrated among the poor from the

1970s to the 1990s, while homicides went from having an inverse relationship with income to

having virtually no relationship. Thacher (2004) advanced Levitt’s (1999a) research by system-

atically examining whether demographic changes in economic groups accounted for crime rate

changes in economic groups over time.

292 Criminal Justice Review 42(3)