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The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States
While the impact of climate on regional geopolitical stability and large‐scale conflict has garnered increased visibility in recent years, the effects of climate variability on interpersonal violent crime have received only limited scientific attention. Though earlier studies have established a mode...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
John Wiley and Sons Inc.
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7007136/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32159007 http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2018GH000152 |
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author | Harp, Ryan D. Karnauskas, Kristopher B. |
author_facet | Harp, Ryan D. Karnauskas, Kristopher B. |
author_sort | Harp, Ryan D. |
collection | PubMed |
description | While the impact of climate on regional geopolitical stability and large‐scale conflict has garnered increased visibility in recent years, the effects of climate variability on interpersonal violent crime have received only limited scientific attention. Though earlier studies have established a modest correlation between temperature and violent crime, the underlying seasonality in both variables was often not controlled for and spatial heterogeneity of the statistical relationships has largely been overlooked. Here a method of spatial aggregation is applied to the United States, enabling a systematic investigation into the observed relationships between large‐scale climate variability and regionally aggregated crime rates. This novel approach allows for differentiation between the effects of two previously proposed mechanisms linking climate and violent crime, the Routine Activities Theory and Temperature‐Aggression Hypothesis. Results indicate large and statistically significant positive correlations between the interannual variability of wintertime air temperature and both violent and property crime rates, with negligible correlations emerging from summertime data. Results strongly support the Routine Activities Theory linking climate and violent crime, with climate variability explaining well over a third of the variance of wintertime violent crime in several broad regions of the United States. Finally, results motivate the development of observationally constrained empirical models and their potential application to seasonal and potentially longer‐term forecasts. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7007136 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | John Wiley and Sons Inc. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-70071362020-03-10 The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States Harp, Ryan D. Karnauskas, Kristopher B. Geohealth Research Articles While the impact of climate on regional geopolitical stability and large‐scale conflict has garnered increased visibility in recent years, the effects of climate variability on interpersonal violent crime have received only limited scientific attention. Though earlier studies have established a modest correlation between temperature and violent crime, the underlying seasonality in both variables was often not controlled for and spatial heterogeneity of the statistical relationships has largely been overlooked. Here a method of spatial aggregation is applied to the United States, enabling a systematic investigation into the observed relationships between large‐scale climate variability and regionally aggregated crime rates. This novel approach allows for differentiation between the effects of two previously proposed mechanisms linking climate and violent crime, the Routine Activities Theory and Temperature‐Aggression Hypothesis. Results indicate large and statistically significant positive correlations between the interannual variability of wintertime air temperature and both violent and property crime rates, with negligible correlations emerging from summertime data. Results strongly support the Routine Activities Theory linking climate and violent crime, with climate variability explaining well over a third of the variance of wintertime violent crime in several broad regions of the United States. Finally, results motivate the development of observationally constrained empirical models and their potential application to seasonal and potentially longer‐term forecasts. John Wiley and Sons Inc. 2018-11-21 /pmc/articles/PMC7007136/ /pubmed/32159007 http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2018GH000152 Text en ©2018. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non‐commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made. |
spellingShingle | Research Articles Harp, Ryan D. Karnauskas, Kristopher B. The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title | The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title_full | The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title_fullStr | The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title_full_unstemmed | The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title_short | The Influence of Interannual Climate Variability on Regional Violent Crime Rates in the United States |
title_sort | influence of interannual climate variability on regional violent crime rates in the united states |
topic | Research Articles |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7007136/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32159007 http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2018GH000152 |
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