Abstract
Fear of crime has been a dominant area of criminological inquiry, yet it is has been examined only recently in a Chinese context, and it is virtually unexplored in Hong Kong. Using a sample of 170 Hong Kong college students majoring in social work, the current study aimed to investigate the effects of gender on fear of crime and their relationships to attitudes toward prisoners. In general, women reported a significantly greater fear of crime than men for all offenses except for being cheated. Fear of rape/sexual assault was found to be a significant predictor of fear of serious crimes for women but a less significant predictor of their fear of minor crimes. The shadow of the sexual assault hypothesis was supported in this study. Fear of crime had little impact on attitudes toward prisoners.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 479-494 |
| Number of pages | 16 |
| Journal | International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology |
| Volume | 57 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Apr 2013 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- attitudes toward prisoners
- fear of crime
- gender
- Hong Kong Chinese
- social work majors
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Pathology and Forensic Medicine
- Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)
- Applied Psychology
