Community Crime Prevention and Intimate Violence in Chicago, 1995-1998

This study sought to answer the question: If a woman is experiencing intimate partner violence, does the collective efficacy and community capacity of her neighborhood facilitate or erect barriers to her ability to escape violence, other things being equal? To address this question, longitudinal data on a sample of 210 abused women from the CHICAGO WOMEN'S HEALTH RISK STUDY, 1995-1998 (ICPSR 3002) were combined with community context data for each woman's residential neighborhood taken from the Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy (CAPS) evaluation, LONGITUDINAL EVALUATION OF CHICAGO'S COMMUNITY POLICING PROGRAM, 1993-2000 (ICPSR 3335). The unit of analysis for the study is the individual abused woman (not the neighborhood). The study takes the point of view of a woman standing at a street address and looking around her. The characteristics of the small geographical area immediately surrounding her residential address form the community context for that woman. Researchers chose the police beat as the best definition of a woman's neighborhood, because it is the smallest Chicago area for which reliable and complete data are available. The characteristics of the woman's police beat then became the community context for each woman. The beat, district, and community area of the woman's address are present. Neighborhood-level variables include voter turnout percentage, organizational involvement, percentage of households on public aid, percentage of housing that was vacant, percentage of housing units owned, percentage of feminine poverty households, assault rate, and drug crime rate. Individual-level demographic variables include the race, ethnicity, age, marital status, income, and level of education of the woman and the abuser. Other individual-level variables include the Social Support Network (SSN) scale, language the interview was conducted in, Harass score, Power and Control score, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) diagnosis, other data pertaining to the respondent's emotional and physical health, and changes over the past year. Also included are details about the woman's household, such as whether she was homeless, the number of people living in the household and details about each person, the number of her children or other children in the household, details of any of her children not living in her household, and any changes in the household structure over the past year. Help-seeking in the past year includes whether the woman had sought medical care, had contacted the police, or had sought help from an agency or counselor, and whether she had an order of protection. Several variables reflect whether the woman left or tried to leave the relationship in the past year. Finally, the dataset includes summary variables about violent incidents in the past year (severity, recency, and frequency), and in the follow-up period.

本研究旨在探讨以下问题：若一位女性正遭受亲密伴侣暴力，其居住社区的整体效能与社区承载能力是否会在其他条件不变的情况下，促进或形成障碍，从而影响她逃离暴力的能力？为解答此问题，研究结合了1995-1998年芝加哥女性健康风险研究（CHICAGO WOMEN'S HEALTH RISK STUDY，ICPSR 3002）中210名受虐女性的纵向数据，以及每位女性居住社区的社会环境数据，这些数据来源于芝加哥替代警务策略（Chicago Alternative Policing Strategy，CAPS）评估，即《芝加哥社区警务项目纵向评估》（LONGITUDINAL EVALUATION OF CHICAGO'S COMMUNITY POLICING PROGRAM，ICPSR 3335）。本研究分析的单位为受虐女性个体（而非社区）。研究视角设定为一位女性站在其住宅地址前，环顾四周。她居住地址周围的小型地理区域特征构成了她的社区环境。研究人员选择警察巡逻区作为女性社区的最佳定义，因为它是最小的且数据可靠、完整的芝加哥区域。女性的警察巡逻区特征因此成为每位女性的社区环境。社区层面的变量包括选民投票率、组织参与度、接受公共援助的家庭比例、空置住房比例、住房单元所有权比例、女性贫困家庭比例、袭击率以及毒品犯罪率。个体层面的社会经济变量包括女性的种族、民族、年龄、婚姻状况、收入和教育水平，以及施暴者的相关信息。其他个体层面变量包括社会支持网络（SSN）量表、访谈语言、骚扰评分、权力与控制评分、创伤后应激障碍（PTSD）诊断、与受访者情感和身体健康相关的其他数据，以及过去一年的变化。此外，还包括关于女性家庭细节的信息，如她是否无家可归、家庭居住人数及每个人详情、子女数量或其他家庭成员，以及任何子女不居住在家庭中的详情，以及过去一年家庭结构的变化。过去一年的求助情况包括女性是否寻求过医疗护理、是否联系过警方，或是否寻求过机构或顾问的帮助，以及她是否拥有保护令。一些变量反映了女性在过去一年是否离开或尝试离开关系。最后，数据集还包括过去一年及后续期间暴力事件摘要变量（严重程度、发生频率和最近一次发生的时间）。