The association between fear of crime, educational attainment, and healthShow others and affiliations
2023 (English)In: Epidemiologia, E-ISSN 2673-3986, Vol. 4, no 2, p. 148-162Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
Fear of crime is an important public health problem that impacts people’s quality oflife, health, and wellbeing, and causes mental health ailments (e.g., anxiety). This study aimed todetermine whether there was an association between fear of crime, educational attainment, andself-rated health and anxiety among women residing in a county in east-central Sweden. A sample(n = 3002) of women aged 18–84 years surveyed in the Health on Equal Terms survey carried outin 2018 was included in the study. Bivariate and multivariate regression analysis was performedon the relationship between the composite variables fear of crime, educational attainment, andself-rated health and anxiety. Women with primary education or similar who reported fear of crimehad increased odds of poor health (odds ratio (OR) 3.17; 95% confidence interval (CI) 2.40–4.18)compared with women with primary education/similar and no fear of crime (OR 2.90; CI 1.90–3.20).A statistically significant relationship persisted in the multivariate analysis after controlling forother covariates, although the odds were reduced (OR 1.70; CI 1.14–2.53 and 1.73; CI 1.21–2.48,respectively). Similarly, in the bivariate analysis, women who reported fear of crime and whoonly had primary education had statistically significant odds of anxiety (OR 2.12; CI 1.64–2.74); thesignificance was removed, and the odds were reduced (OR 1.30; CI 0.93–1.82) after adjusting fordemographic, socioeconomic, and health-related covariates. Women with only primary educationor similar who reported fear of crime had higher odds of poor health and anxiety compared withthose with university education or similar, with and without fear of crime. Future studies (includinglongitudinal ones) are warranted—on the one hand, to understand possible mechanisms of therelationship between educational attainment and fear of crime and its consequences to health, and onthe other, to explore low-educated women’s own perceptions regarding factors underlining their fearof crime (qualitative studies).
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
MDPI , 2023. Vol. 4, no 2, p. 148-162
Keywords [en]
fear of crime; educational attainment; women; self-rated health; anxiety; Gävleborg
National Category
Public Health, Global Health and Social Medicine
Research subject
Health-Promoting Work
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hig:diva-41714DOI: 10.3390/epidemiologia4020016ISI: 001178478600001PubMedID: 37218875Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85165094061OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hig-41714DiVA, id: diva2:1753857
2023-04-302023-04-302025-02-20Bibliographically approved