Making environmental criminology smarter - Recent advances in the measurement of activity spaces and their impact on crime location choices

• In Event: WG-PLACE 6: Research on crime, place and time

Abstract

Where and when people spend time is central to environmental criminological explanations for crime patterns. However, since these theories emerged in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the field has consistently been hindered by its inability to directly measure the primary explanatory variable: the routine space-time behaviour of individuals. In this presentation, we present two recent advances in the field: (a) the use of GPS-tracking data to measure routine activities, and (b) the application of graph theory metrics to street networks to infer possible travel behaviour. Empirical examples from Australia and the Netherlands underscore the potential of these approaches to advance the field.

Authors

• Stijn Ruiter, NSCR / Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

• Daniel Birks, Leeds University