Sampson RJ, Raudenbush SW, Earls F. Neighborhoods and violent crime: a multilevel study of collective efficacy. Science. 1997; 277: 918-924

Another look at the relationship of social cohesion and violent crime as an explanation for the association of violence with low socioeconomic status. Looking at neighborhood clusters in Chicago, they find that the effectiveness of informal mechanisms by which residents achieve public order, is related to lower violent crime rates. The term collective efficacy of a neighborhood is the linkage of mutual trust and the willingness to intervene for the common good and is a means by which urban neighborhoods inhibit occurrence of personal violence. This study, coupled with the links between income inequality and social capital in the Kawachi study above lend strong support for social cohesion being a strong factor through which relative deprivation affects health.

Abstract

It is hypothesized that collective efficacy, defined as social cohesion among neighbors combined with their willingness to intervene on behalf of the common good, is linked to reduced violence. This hypothesis was tested on a 1995 survey of 8782 residents of 343 neighborhoods in Chicago, Illinois. Multilevel analyses showed that a measure of collective efficacy yields a high between-neighborhood reliability and is negatively associated with variations in violence, when individual-level characteristics, measurement error, and prior violence are controlled. Associations of concentrated disadvantage and residential instability with violence are largely mediated by collective efficacy.

Keywords

• city
• crime
• homicide
• neighborhoods
• poverty
• race
• social capital
• social cohesion
• socioeconomic status
• unemployment
• violence
• violent crime