1. Objectifs

Intentions :
«This study addresses an important gap in the literature which has yet to address the environmental predictors of child perceived neighborhood safety or to jointly examine parent and child perceived safety.» (p. 12)

Questions/Hypothèses :
«The main hypothesis is that children’s perceptions of safety are directly associated with environmental features indicative of traffic and personal safety. A second hypothesis is that environmental features are also indirectly associated with child perceived safety, by virtue of their influence on parent perceived safety.» (p. 12)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
L’échantillon est composé de 484 familles.

Instruments :
Questionnaires

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

«Our results suggest that parent and child perceived safety, though associated with each other, are predicted by different aspects of the neighborhood. Children draw inferences of safety from basic social and physical cues such as the number of trees, amount of lighting, and the proportion of visible minorities.» (p. 19) «The association between child and parent perceived safety may be due to parents actively shaping their child’s perceptions (e.g., telling them it is not safe to play outside). Alternatively, children and their parents may experience similar levels of fear and react similarly to shared environments. Either way, the results identify neighborhood features that could come to influence child perceived safety through or along with parents’ perceptions.» (p. 20)