ASSIGNMENT
Guardianship is the presence of one or more people who can potentially stop a crime. It has been a key factor in deterring criminals. With technology coming into the mix, it creates new challenges to understand what guardianship is: when you do not see anyone but you do see cameras is someone watching you? As guardianship is vital to deter criminals, it is necessary that we know what guardianship can consist of and how we can make sure that guardianship is present in for example neighbourhoods to deter burglars.
In this internship, you will help set-upa new research project to define guardianship and to test whether this new definition would be viable in scientific research. Your research will contribute to practice and policy making by showing the limits and benefits of guardianship and how we should foster guardianship. In this project, there are unlimited topics within guardianship you can tackle. You could set-up a study to train people to become guardians, use a VR-environment to see how people respond to measures that makes it seem as if someone is in their neighbourhood, such as dynamics lighting, or see if people will act more as guardians if they know their neighbour is (secretly) judging them. The internship student has to be willing to do extensive literature research, collaborate to construct new research and collect data.
You will have a lot of freedom in this internship to set-up research and your own contribution to this study is valued and highly appreciated.
KEYWORDS
Guardianship; crime prevention.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION ORGANIZATION
The section Psychology of Conflict, Risk and Safety at the University of Twente has a distinctive and unique profile in the areas of risk perception and risk communication, conflict and crisis management and the antecedents of risky, antisocial and criminal behaviour. It currently includes 15 research staff members and 6 PhD students. We work from both a psychology and an engineering perspective and cooperate with other scientific disciplines, based on the “high tech, human touch” profile of the University of Twente.
AVAILABILITY
Usually anytime. This internship is open for 1 student.
INTERESTED?
Please contact the internship coordinator Miriam Oostinga (m.s.d.oostinga@utwente.nl).
LITERATURE
- Reynald, D. M. (2009). Guardianship in action: Developing a new tool for measurement. Crime Prevention and Community Safety, 11(1), 1-20.
- Van Sintemaartensdijk, I., Van Gelder, J. L., Van Prooijen, J. W., Nee, C., Otte, M., & Van Lange, P. (2021). Mere presence of informal guardians deters burglars: A virtual reality study. Journal of Experimental Criminology, 17(4), 657-676.