Comprehensive crime data sets have been collected over time, which contain the location and time ... more Comprehensive crime data sets have been collected over time, which contain the location and time of different crime types such as aggravated assault or burglary. To understand the patterns and trends in such data, existing mapping and analysis methods often focus on one selected perspective (e.g., temporal trend or spatial distribution). It is a more challenging task to discover and understand complex crime patterns that involve multiple perspectives such as spatio-temporal trends of different crime types. In this Chapter we used a data mining and visual analytics approach to analyze the crime data of Philadelphia, PA, which has all the crimes reported from January 2007 to June 2011. Speci fi cally, the adopted approach is a space-time and multivariate visualization system (VIS-STAMP) and the analysis examines the spatial and temporal patterns across six crime types, including aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, stolen-vehicles, rape and homicide. The geovisual analytic tool provides the capability to visualize multiple dimensions simultaneously and be able to discover interesting information through a variety of combined perspectives.
Scholars typically use calls to the police to study crime patterning; however, crime reporting ma... more Scholars typically use calls to the police to study crime patterning; however, crime reporting may be systematic across space. Using spatial video and geonarrative methodology, we investigate the overlap between perceived crime hot spots among 35 neighbourhood insiders (police officers, ex-offenders and residents) and hot spots gleaned from call data. In general, perceptual hot spots diverge from call data, but in particular, a corner store emerges as a perceptual hot spot across all groups, but not in call data. We use our data to explore the microgeographic dynamics of this ‘hidden hot spot’. We find that the corner store is relatively isolated, with few occupied residences around it and participants avoiding it. In addition, our geonarratives suggest that the store lacks adequate guardianship. We argue that mixed methodological approaches such as these are useful for understanding discrepancies between measures as well as the situational and environmental dynamics of problem places.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2022
The street homeless, those who spend their nights either in shelters or unofficial camps, whether... more The street homeless, those who spend their nights either in shelters or unofficial camps, whether in tents on a street or in society’s hidden spaces such as beneath an overpass, face multiple challenges beyond finding a safe place to sleep. Of further concern is how official actions can worsen these situations, through day-to-day activities or planned intervention strategies. In this paper we explore how a planned intervention may be negatively perceived—even as a form of “structural violence”—and may prevent Narcan (naloxone) use to stop an overdose related death in the Skid Row of Los Angeles. Data for this study consisted of a combination of Spatial Video Geonarratives (SVGs) and 325 incident reports from the Homeless Health Care Los Angeles Center for Harm Reduction (HHCLA-HRC) between November 2014 and December 2015. Chi-square and simple logistic regression models were used to examine the association between fear-of-arrest and other covariates of interest. Mapping results are ...
Spatial video geonarratives and health: case studies in post-disaster recovery, crime, mosquito c... more Spatial video geonarratives and health: case studies in post-disaster recovery, crime, mosquito control and tuberculosis in the homeless
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine citizen satisfaction with police services and per... more Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine citizen satisfaction with police services and perceived safety using survey research in two high crime neighborhoods. Problem-oriented crime deterrence strategies were used in one neighborhood, the other served as a control group. Design/methodology/approach Mixed-methods approach was used to measure the effectiveness of problem-oriented approaches in persistent high-crime areas. Pre- and post-intervention surveys were conducted by sampling addresses in both neighborhoods and analyzing results. Findings No between-neighborhood differences were reported regarding the satisfaction with police services or improvement in perceived safety. Originality/value These findings suggest that this deterrence strategy is a promising approach to reducing crime while not damaging community perceptions. However, departments must vary place-based strategies, and prevention is difficult given historical contexts, the absence of credible community partner...
Introduction: Community-related efforts to prevent crime and gang activity include police-led pro... more Introduction: Community-related efforts to prevent crime and gang activity include police-led programming. Previous research has indicated a lack of gang-related prevention efforts at the police level, yet a gap remains as to the clustering of prevention efforts and that relationship to various crime types on a national level. This study seeks to answer two research questions: How is crime and gang prevention categorized according to police-led efforts, and how are crime prevention categories distributed according to crime type and community locality? Methods: Two datasets were case-matched and utilized (N = 405): The 2007 Census for Law Enforcement Gang Units (CLEGU) and the 2007 Law Enforcement Administrative Management Statistics (LEMAS). Latent Class Analysis was performed on eight gang prevention variables from the CLEGU dataset to identify initial categories of prevention activities. Covariates from the LEMAS dataset included crime prevention activities, locality of police dep...
Background: A call has recently been made by the public health and medical communities to underst... more Background: A call has recently been made by the public health and medical communities to understand the neighborhood context of a patient's life in order to improve education and treatment. To do this, methods are required that can collect "contextual" characteristics while complementing the spatial analysis of more traditional data. This also needs to happen within a standardized, transferable, easy-to-implement framework. Methods: The Spatial Video Geonarrative (SVG) is an environmentally-cued narrative where place is used to stimulate discussion about fine-scale geographic characteristics of an area and the context of their occurrence. It is a simple yet powerful approach to enable collection and spatial analysis of expert and resident health-related perceptions and experiences of places. Participants comment about where they live or work while guiding a driver through the area. Four GPS-enabled cameras are attached to the vehicle to capture the places that are observed and discussed by the participant. Audio recording of this narrative is linked to the video via time stamp. A program (G-Code) is then used to geotag each word as a point in a geographic information system (GIS). Querying and density analysis can then be performed on the narrative text to identify spatial patterns within one narrative or across multiple narratives. This approach is illustrated using case studies on post-disaster psychopathology, crime, mosquito control, and TB in homeless populations. Results: SVG can be used to map individual, group, or contested group context for an environment. The method can also gather data for cohorts where traditional spatial data are absent. In addition, SVG provides a means to spatially capture, map and archive institutional knowledge. Conclusions: SVG GIS output can be used to advance theory by being used as input into qualitative and/or spatial analyses. SVG can also be used to gain near-real time insight therefore supporting applied interventions. Advances over existing geonarrative approaches include the simultaneous collection of video data to visually support any commentary, and the ease-of-application making it a transferable method across different environments and skillsets.
Using Computer Simulations and Geographic Information Systems
Patrolling in a nonrandom, but focused manner is an important activity in law enforcement. The us... more Patrolling in a nonrandom, but focused manner is an important activity in law enforcement. The use of geographic information systems, the emerging real-time data sets (spatial and nonspatial) and the ability via global positioning systems to identify locations of patrol units provide the environment to discuss the concept and requirements of an intelligent patrol routing system. This intelligent patrol routing system will combine available data utilizing Map Algebra and a data structure known as a Voronoi diagram to create a real-time updatable raster surface over the patrolling area to identify destination locations and routes for all patrol units. This information system will allow all patrol units to function “in concert” under a coordinated plan, and make good use of limited patrolling resources, and provide the means of evaluating current patrol strategies. This chapter discusses the algorithmic foundation, implications, requirements, and simulation of a GIS based intelligent p...
Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health, 2014
Background: The study sought to explore the characteristics, risk factors for inpatient recommend... more Background: The study sought to explore the characteristics, risk factors for inpatient recommendation, and risk factors for revisits to a pediatric psychiatric intake response center (PIRC). There are three research questions: 1. What is the general profile of pediatric patients who present at the PIRC? 2. What are the risk factors for patients who repeatedly visit the PIRC? 3. What are the risk factors for PIRC patients who are recommended to inpatient care? Methods: The study utilized a retrospective medical chart review of a random sample (n = 260). A PIRC profile was created using frequency and prevalence calculations, in addition to a survival analysis of patients who return to the PIRC in order to determine how long it takes for PIRC patients to return to the PIRC. Factors that contribute to increased odds of returning to PIRC and being recommended for inpatient treatment were calculated using two logistic regression analyses. Results: The average pediatric PIRC patient is about 13 years old, Caucasian, with Medicaid and comes from a divorced or single parent household. About 43% of patients presented at PIRC for suicidal thoughts, ideation, intentions or actions. At least 63% of patients have a history of victimization. The average time to return to PIRC is about 90 days. Patients with a history of victimization, suicidal behavior, learning problems, problems with peers, and a history of violence were at an increased odds of returning to the PIRC. Those patients who were previously admitted to inpatient care and had a family history of mental health issues were at increased odds of being recommended to inpatient treatment. Conclusions: This sample presents with a multitude of issues that contribute to increased odds of revisits to PIRC and inpatient recommendation. These issues seem to come from multiple levels of influence. Future research should expand to similar treatment facilities and use a prospective design to confirm risk factors. Treatment for pediatric psychiatric patients may focus on multiple factors that influence patients' mental health.
The purpose of this study is to examine risk factors for poly-traumatization, and the impact of p... more The purpose of this study is to examine risk factors for poly-traumatization, and the impact of poly-traumatization on harmful behaviors (suicidal, self-harm, and violent), among a group of pediatric patients presenting at an emergency department's psychiatric intake response center. We employed a retrospective medical chart review in a children's hospital for a 2-year span (N=260). The study employed 2 statistical analyses. The first analysis used multinomial logistic regression to model the odds of harmful behaviors comparing increasing numbers of co-occurring traumatization types. The second analysis employed latent class modeling techniques in three ways to (a) define different poly-traumatization populations, (b) examine the relationship between predictors and class assignment, and (c) examine the relationship between class assignment and harmful behavioral outcomes. About 62% of the sample presented with at least 1 traumatization type and about 50% one harmful behavior type. Compared to those with 1, 2, or 3 traumatization types, patients with 4 or more traumatization types have higher odds of harmful behaviors. The latent class analysis revealed 2 populations: High serious victimization and minimal traumatization. History of family mental health issues was the only significant predictor of class membership. Class membership was associated with all of the harmful behavioral outcome categories. These findings support consideration of poly-traumatization as a risk factor for the high occurrence of harmful behaviors in this sample of pediatric psychiatric patients and that history of family mental health issues may contribute to the high co-occurrence of poly-traumatization.
The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data afford unique opportunities to inform c... more The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data afford unique opportunities to inform crime analytic efforts. Recently reported relationships between the availability of firearms and violent crime constitute one such effort. While available criminological literature concerning the relationships between guns and crime are methodologically varied and equivocal, few studies have examined the issue of the prevalence of illegal versus legal guns and their impacts on reported violent crime. Inspired by an earlier effort to examine this question (Stolzenberg & D'Alessio, 2000), this study attempts to replicate these findings through county-level analyses of West Virginia National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data. Moreover, additional proxy indicators are used to identify significant clusters of illegal guns and examine the relationship between illegal guns and violent crime. Particular attention is paid to the spatial distribution of the variables and the potentia...
The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of multiple adverse life experiences (sexua... more The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of multiple adverse life experiences (sexual abuse, homelessness, running away, and substance abuse in the family) on suicide ideation and suicide attempt among adolescents at an urban juvenile detention facility in the United States. Materials and Methods: The study sample included a total of 3,156 adolescents processed at a juvenile detention facility in an urban area in Ohio between 2003 and 2007. The participants, interacting anonymously with a voice enabled computer, self-administered a questionnaire with 100 items related to health risk behaviors. Results: Overall 19.0% reported ever having thought about suicide (suicide ideation) and 11.9% reported ever having attempted suicide (suicide attempt). In the multivariable logistic regression analysis those reporting sexual abuse (Odds Ratio = 2.75; 95% confidence interval = 2.08-3.63) and homelessness (1.51; 1.17-1.94) were associated with increased odds of suicide ideation, while sexual abuse (3.01; 2.22-4.08), homelessness (1.49; 1.12-1.98), and running away from home (1.38; 1.06-1.81) were associated with increased odds of a suicide attempt. Those experiencing all four adverse events were 7.81 times more likely (2.41-25.37) to report having ever attempted suicide than those who experienced none of the adverse events. Conclusions: Considering the high prevalence of adverse life experiences and their association with suicidal behaviors in detained adolescents, these factors should not only be included in the suicide screening tools at the intake and during detention, but should also be used for the intervention programming for suicide prevention.
Comprehensive crime data sets have been collected over time, which contain the location and time ... more Comprehensive crime data sets have been collected over time, which contain the location and time of different crime types such as aggravated assault or burglary. To understand the patterns and trends in such data, existing mapping and analysis methods often focus on one selected perspective (e.g., temporal trend or spatial distribution). It is a more challenging task to discover and understand complex crime patterns that involve multiple perspectives such as spatio-temporal trends of different crime types. In this Chapter we used a data mining and visual analytics approach to analyze the crime data of Philadelphia, PA, which has all the crimes reported from January 2007 to June 2011. Speci fi cally, the adopted approach is a space-time and multivariate visualization system (VIS-STAMP) and the analysis examines the spatial and temporal patterns across six crime types, including aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, stolen-vehicles, rape and homicide. The geovisual analytic tool provides the capability to visualize multiple dimensions simultaneously and be able to discover interesting information through a variety of combined perspectives.
Scholars typically use calls to the police to study crime patterning; however, crime reporting ma... more Scholars typically use calls to the police to study crime patterning; however, crime reporting may be systematic across space. Using spatial video and geonarrative methodology, we investigate the overlap between perceived crime hot spots among 35 neighbourhood insiders (police officers, ex-offenders and residents) and hot spots gleaned from call data. In general, perceptual hot spots diverge from call data, but in particular, a corner store emerges as a perceptual hot spot across all groups, but not in call data. We use our data to explore the microgeographic dynamics of this ‘hidden hot spot’. We find that the corner store is relatively isolated, with few occupied residences around it and participants avoiding it. In addition, our geonarratives suggest that the store lacks adequate guardianship. We argue that mixed methodological approaches such as these are useful for understanding discrepancies between measures as well as the situational and environmental dynamics of problem places.
International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2022
The street homeless, those who spend their nights either in shelters or unofficial camps, whether... more The street homeless, those who spend their nights either in shelters or unofficial camps, whether in tents on a street or in society’s hidden spaces such as beneath an overpass, face multiple challenges beyond finding a safe place to sleep. Of further concern is how official actions can worsen these situations, through day-to-day activities or planned intervention strategies. In this paper we explore how a planned intervention may be negatively perceived—even as a form of “structural violence”—and may prevent Narcan (naloxone) use to stop an overdose related death in the Skid Row of Los Angeles. Data for this study consisted of a combination of Spatial Video Geonarratives (SVGs) and 325 incident reports from the Homeless Health Care Los Angeles Center for Harm Reduction (HHCLA-HRC) between November 2014 and December 2015. Chi-square and simple logistic regression models were used to examine the association between fear-of-arrest and other covariates of interest. Mapping results are ...
Spatial video geonarratives and health: case studies in post-disaster recovery, crime, mosquito c... more Spatial video geonarratives and health: case studies in post-disaster recovery, crime, mosquito control and tuberculosis in the homeless
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine citizen satisfaction with police services and per... more Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine citizen satisfaction with police services and perceived safety using survey research in two high crime neighborhoods. Problem-oriented crime deterrence strategies were used in one neighborhood, the other served as a control group. Design/methodology/approach Mixed-methods approach was used to measure the effectiveness of problem-oriented approaches in persistent high-crime areas. Pre- and post-intervention surveys were conducted by sampling addresses in both neighborhoods and analyzing results. Findings No between-neighborhood differences were reported regarding the satisfaction with police services or improvement in perceived safety. Originality/value These findings suggest that this deterrence strategy is a promising approach to reducing crime while not damaging community perceptions. However, departments must vary place-based strategies, and prevention is difficult given historical contexts, the absence of credible community partner...
Introduction: Community-related efforts to prevent crime and gang activity include police-led pro... more Introduction: Community-related efforts to prevent crime and gang activity include police-led programming. Previous research has indicated a lack of gang-related prevention efforts at the police level, yet a gap remains as to the clustering of prevention efforts and that relationship to various crime types on a national level. This study seeks to answer two research questions: How is crime and gang prevention categorized according to police-led efforts, and how are crime prevention categories distributed according to crime type and community locality? Methods: Two datasets were case-matched and utilized (N = 405): The 2007 Census for Law Enforcement Gang Units (CLEGU) and the 2007 Law Enforcement Administrative Management Statistics (LEMAS). Latent Class Analysis was performed on eight gang prevention variables from the CLEGU dataset to identify initial categories of prevention activities. Covariates from the LEMAS dataset included crime prevention activities, locality of police dep...
Background: A call has recently been made by the public health and medical communities to underst... more Background: A call has recently been made by the public health and medical communities to understand the neighborhood context of a patient's life in order to improve education and treatment. To do this, methods are required that can collect "contextual" characteristics while complementing the spatial analysis of more traditional data. This also needs to happen within a standardized, transferable, easy-to-implement framework. Methods: The Spatial Video Geonarrative (SVG) is an environmentally-cued narrative where place is used to stimulate discussion about fine-scale geographic characteristics of an area and the context of their occurrence. It is a simple yet powerful approach to enable collection and spatial analysis of expert and resident health-related perceptions and experiences of places. Participants comment about where they live or work while guiding a driver through the area. Four GPS-enabled cameras are attached to the vehicle to capture the places that are observed and discussed by the participant. Audio recording of this narrative is linked to the video via time stamp. A program (G-Code) is then used to geotag each word as a point in a geographic information system (GIS). Querying and density analysis can then be performed on the narrative text to identify spatial patterns within one narrative or across multiple narratives. This approach is illustrated using case studies on post-disaster psychopathology, crime, mosquito control, and TB in homeless populations. Results: SVG can be used to map individual, group, or contested group context for an environment. The method can also gather data for cohorts where traditional spatial data are absent. In addition, SVG provides a means to spatially capture, map and archive institutional knowledge. Conclusions: SVG GIS output can be used to advance theory by being used as input into qualitative and/or spatial analyses. SVG can also be used to gain near-real time insight therefore supporting applied interventions. Advances over existing geonarrative approaches include the simultaneous collection of video data to visually support any commentary, and the ease-of-application making it a transferable method across different environments and skillsets.
Using Computer Simulations and Geographic Information Systems
Patrolling in a nonrandom, but focused manner is an important activity in law enforcement. The us... more Patrolling in a nonrandom, but focused manner is an important activity in law enforcement. The use of geographic information systems, the emerging real-time data sets (spatial and nonspatial) and the ability via global positioning systems to identify locations of patrol units provide the environment to discuss the concept and requirements of an intelligent patrol routing system. This intelligent patrol routing system will combine available data utilizing Map Algebra and a data structure known as a Voronoi diagram to create a real-time updatable raster surface over the patrolling area to identify destination locations and routes for all patrol units. This information system will allow all patrol units to function “in concert” under a coordinated plan, and make good use of limited patrolling resources, and provide the means of evaluating current patrol strategies. This chapter discusses the algorithmic foundation, implications, requirements, and simulation of a GIS based intelligent p...
Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health, 2014
Background: The study sought to explore the characteristics, risk factors for inpatient recommend... more Background: The study sought to explore the characteristics, risk factors for inpatient recommendation, and risk factors for revisits to a pediatric psychiatric intake response center (PIRC). There are three research questions: 1. What is the general profile of pediatric patients who present at the PIRC? 2. What are the risk factors for patients who repeatedly visit the PIRC? 3. What are the risk factors for PIRC patients who are recommended to inpatient care? Methods: The study utilized a retrospective medical chart review of a random sample (n = 260). A PIRC profile was created using frequency and prevalence calculations, in addition to a survival analysis of patients who return to the PIRC in order to determine how long it takes for PIRC patients to return to the PIRC. Factors that contribute to increased odds of returning to PIRC and being recommended for inpatient treatment were calculated using two logistic regression analyses. Results: The average pediatric PIRC patient is about 13 years old, Caucasian, with Medicaid and comes from a divorced or single parent household. About 43% of patients presented at PIRC for suicidal thoughts, ideation, intentions or actions. At least 63% of patients have a history of victimization. The average time to return to PIRC is about 90 days. Patients with a history of victimization, suicidal behavior, learning problems, problems with peers, and a history of violence were at an increased odds of returning to the PIRC. Those patients who were previously admitted to inpatient care and had a family history of mental health issues were at increased odds of being recommended to inpatient treatment. Conclusions: This sample presents with a multitude of issues that contribute to increased odds of revisits to PIRC and inpatient recommendation. These issues seem to come from multiple levels of influence. Future research should expand to similar treatment facilities and use a prospective design to confirm risk factors. Treatment for pediatric psychiatric patients may focus on multiple factors that influence patients' mental health.
The purpose of this study is to examine risk factors for poly-traumatization, and the impact of p... more The purpose of this study is to examine risk factors for poly-traumatization, and the impact of poly-traumatization on harmful behaviors (suicidal, self-harm, and violent), among a group of pediatric patients presenting at an emergency department's psychiatric intake response center. We employed a retrospective medical chart review in a children's hospital for a 2-year span (N=260). The study employed 2 statistical analyses. The first analysis used multinomial logistic regression to model the odds of harmful behaviors comparing increasing numbers of co-occurring traumatization types. The second analysis employed latent class modeling techniques in three ways to (a) define different poly-traumatization populations, (b) examine the relationship between predictors and class assignment, and (c) examine the relationship between class assignment and harmful behavioral outcomes. About 62% of the sample presented with at least 1 traumatization type and about 50% one harmful behavior type. Compared to those with 1, 2, or 3 traumatization types, patients with 4 or more traumatization types have higher odds of harmful behaviors. The latent class analysis revealed 2 populations: High serious victimization and minimal traumatization. History of family mental health issues was the only significant predictor of class membership. Class membership was associated with all of the harmful behavioral outcome categories. These findings support consideration of poly-traumatization as a risk factor for the high occurrence of harmful behaviors in this sample of pediatric psychiatric patients and that history of family mental health issues may contribute to the high co-occurrence of poly-traumatization.
The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data afford unique opportunities to inform c... more The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data afford unique opportunities to inform crime analytic efforts. Recently reported relationships between the availability of firearms and violent crime constitute one such effort. While available criminological literature concerning the relationships between guns and crime are methodologically varied and equivocal, few studies have examined the issue of the prevalence of illegal versus legal guns and their impacts on reported violent crime. Inspired by an earlier effort to examine this question (Stolzenberg & D'Alessio, 2000), this study attempts to replicate these findings through county-level analyses of West Virginia National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) data. Moreover, additional proxy indicators are used to identify significant clusters of illegal guns and examine the relationship between illegal guns and violent crime. Particular attention is paid to the spatial distribution of the variables and the potentia...
The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of multiple adverse life experiences (sexua... more The purpose of this study was to assess the influence of multiple adverse life experiences (sexual abuse, homelessness, running away, and substance abuse in the family) on suicide ideation and suicide attempt among adolescents at an urban juvenile detention facility in the United States. Materials and Methods: The study sample included a total of 3,156 adolescents processed at a juvenile detention facility in an urban area in Ohio between 2003 and 2007. The participants, interacting anonymously with a voice enabled computer, self-administered a questionnaire with 100 items related to health risk behaviors. Results: Overall 19.0% reported ever having thought about suicide (suicide ideation) and 11.9% reported ever having attempted suicide (suicide attempt). In the multivariable logistic regression analysis those reporting sexual abuse (Odds Ratio = 2.75; 95% confidence interval = 2.08-3.63) and homelessness (1.51; 1.17-1.94) were associated with increased odds of suicide ideation, while sexual abuse (3.01; 2.22-4.08), homelessness (1.49; 1.12-1.98), and running away from home (1.38; 1.06-1.81) were associated with increased odds of a suicide attempt. Those experiencing all four adverse events were 7.81 times more likely (2.41-25.37) to report having ever attempted suicide than those who experienced none of the adverse events. Conclusions: Considering the high prevalence of adverse life experiences and their association with suicidal behaviors in detained adolescents, these factors should not only be included in the suicide screening tools at the intake and during detention, but should also be used for the intervention programming for suicide prevention.
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Papers by Eric Jefferis