Citation

Winkel FW. Br. J. Criminol. 1987; 27(2): 155-173.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1987, Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, Publisher Oxford University Press)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Mass media campaigns are increasingly being used as a crime control strategy. Some of these are campaigns designed to encourage potential victims to take simple prccautions to reduce opportunities. Generally, this strategy has been considered innocuous: at worst, it has been thought that campaigns will fail to produce their intended effects. Response generalisation theory, developed here, contradicts this notion. The core of the theory is that communication might also result in unintended and unwanted effects, e.g. by stimulating the extent of public agreement with undesirable reactions to crime. Experimental results confirm this hypothesis. Those exposed to such messages show high communicative and emotional involvement with crime, or a high risk-assessment. The implications of response generalisation for crime prevention campaigns are discussed and strategies for avoiding thcse side-effects proposed.