background
Guardianship is the presence of one or more people who can potentially stop a crime and is 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.
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 dynamic lighting, or see if people will act more as guardians if they know their neighbour is (secretly) judging them. You will have a lot of freedom in this thesis to set-up your own research, own input is highly appreciated.
research questions
Examples of potential research questions are:
1. If we let people take the perspective of a criminal, can they understand better how and why to display guardianship?
2. Can we train people to exhibit physical guardianship?
3. What measures make it seem like someone is at home, where in reality there is no one present?
Type of research
The options are experimental, survey or even qualitative approaches, depending on the research questions and preferences of the student.
keywords
Guardianship; crime prevention; behaviour change
information
If you are interested in this topic, please contact Steven Watson via s.j.watson@utwente.nl.
The assignment is open to two students.
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.
Nagin, D. S., Herman, S., & Barnum, T. C. (2023). Collective Guardianship, Reactive and Proactive. Crime and Justice, 52(1), 487-523.