| Guided by social disorganization theory and the concept of spatial autocorrelation, this thesis examined if there is the presence of spatial autocorrelation in crimes, such as robbery, auto theft, and drug crime. Much of this thesis builds on Baller et al.'s study, but the addition of two independent variables, immigrant concentration and residential stability, was tried to apply social disorganization theory effectively. Census data from ICPSR and three kinds of crimes from the Uniform Crime Report (UCR) was used from the 1980s to 1990s. This thesis did not find diffusion procedure of three crimes at the U.S. level but found the clustering of crimes. To improve separated OLS models, two models of spatial autocorrelation were used (e.g., spatial lag model and spatial error model). This study suggests that the relationship between ecological characteristics and crime are more effectively explained, when controlling for spatial autocorrelation. |
