Researching Crime: Effects on Local Society and Mental Wellbeing

This report delves into the multifaceted impacts of crime on local society, focusing on its effects on residents' mental health and the rise of cybercrimes. It examines the tangible and intangible costs of crime, including behavioral changes and investments in security measures. By analyzing academic articles, the report highlights the increasing concern among people regarding crime and their desire for government intervention. It further explores how cybercrimes, facilitated by technological advancements, pose a significant threat. The report concludes by emphasizing the need for a balanced approach to technological innovation that prioritizes security to mitigate the negative consequences of crime on individuals and communities. Desklib offers a wealth of resources, including similar reports and study tools, to further explore this critical issue.

Research skills and
using information

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3
Introduction of the topic – Crime and its effect on the local society :........................................3
Background of the chosen topic :................................................................................................4
Presentation of the articles :........................................................................................................4
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................6
Summary of key findings from both of the articles :..................................................................6
CONCLUSION ...............................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES:...............................................................................................................................9
Books and Journals:....................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Research skills are the ability of a person to collect information about a topic and provide
its findings. The chosen topic for the report file is crime and its effect on local society. This is a
concerned topic in the global perspective from all the population (White, Perrone and Howes,
2019). People want this topic to be studied to analyse some measures that can help in avoiding
this to ensure their safety and security. The following report is based on analysing the topic in a
detailed version. Form clarity the file is divided into two sections. It starts form the information
about the topic, moves to the background (past experiences and events relating to the topic). The
main part of the file is the presentation of two articles that are given by certain researchers. The
section first ends with the presentation of these articles in the words of the author. The second
section starts with a summary of key findings from the articles and ends with the comparison of
the academic articles.
MAIN BODY
TASK 1
Introduction of the topic – Crime and its effect on the local society :
Crime can be defined as a constituted offence that merits community condemnation. In
simple words it is an act that causes harm or damage to a person, a group of people, a community
or to property / assets. This act is against the law and have many types of punishments and fines
according to the extend to which the crime activities has been practised. Generally the authority
to give punishment against the crime and to the practiser is the responsibility of the government
and its specialised departments (John, 2018). The local society is a group of general people that
live together as colony and considered themselves as a part of the community. The crime has a
deep effect on the people and on the large basis to the society as whole. It forms an frightfulness
feeling in the minds of people that lead them to feel insecurity in many ways such as – to roam
alone, go out at late nights, handle their valuable assets or to even leave in the society or a at a
particular area / place. The local people are most effected people from this illegal act and the
practiser of these acts have their most focus on these local people only to minimize the
circumstances they can face and easiness in the process of practising the crime activity. It have a
deep impact on even the physical and mental health of people due to the worry and scared
feeling. The crime keeps on changing and evolving with them time as the government bodies

work in establishing factor that work in avoiding the general ways of crime. The people try their
best to keep them and their families away form these type of activities that even lead to harming
the childhood and form the introvert characteristic in them due to spending their most of the time
at home to be away from the crimes (Radoini, 2020).
Background of the chosen topic :
The crime activities are being practised in the world from a long or it also be said that
these are the part of the world from starting. The crimes also have different ways of doing and
perspectives in the minds of people. It has a vast background. The crimes became so normally
that it can be seen in the daily newspaper about the types of crimes which are happening in the
society. Some are considered as not much punishable that do not harm much while some have
formed a strong fearsome in the minds of people. The ways of doing crime also keeps on
updating with the evolving world. For this, the loopholes in the work are found that can be used
as a way of crime. In the present era, the cyber crime is being boosted and commonly used. The
cyber crime are a way of crime using technology that can lead to loss of the private / secured
data or even loss to monetary assets while sitting at home and just through using technological
innovators (Robert, 2018). The technology has been rapidly updating in the world to have more
value and make the process efficient or easy. This has given the crime practiser the opportunity
to find loopholes in the security of technological tools to enjoy a gain of money or data. The
accounts in the banks are being focused. The password to the secured information or data are
being hacked from the users. Even a single click in the technological tools, from persuasion from
the robber or by mistake can lead to high losses. The cyber crime of money theft form the bank
accounts have become so common that there are even guidelines given by the government to
raise awareness in the minds to people to be secured from the robberies. Many people are even
afraid to use technological tools to avoid the frauds.
Presentation of the articles :
The effects of local area crime on the mental health of residents
According to the article – the effects of local area crime on the mental health of residents
given by Christian Dustmann and Francesco Fasani in the year 2012 the crime has become so
common and have a deep impact that effects the mental health of people that have faced the

crime or spectated / heard in the society. It is among one of the most concerned matter of the
people of Europe. People believes that the government should take measure to keep them away
and secured from these type of activities (Zehr, 2019). The costs of certain crimes can be
analysed even when they are indirect and intangible. There analysation is hard but it is essential
for assessing the best efforts and investment in the process of crime prevention. Some types of
indirect cost that are tangible are – changes in the behaviour such as avoiding going out, not
wearing any type of jewellery when not in a safe place and having or knowing a self defence
weapon or technique, change in the investment money in security tools such as use of alarms,
weapons, cameras, security guards and armoured things. A good mental health is one of the best
in build asset of human nature that must be maintained by people. But the activities of crime are
forcing people to worry about their and their families security of life or of the assets they have.
This negative impact on the mental health shows effect on the daily basis activities of an
individual that he / she does in their work or socially. The crime data in United Kingdom classify
between ten categories that are – drug offence, criminal damage, vehicle theft, other types of
robberies, sexual offence, burglary and also some other type of offences. The crime data
collected represents more than 5500 households with involvence of interviewees of around
10,000 people (Taylor, 2019).
A taxonomy of cyber harms : defining the impacts of cyber attacks and understanding how
they propagate
According to the article of – a taxonomy of cyber harms : defining the impacts of cyber
attacks and understanding how they propagate, given in 2018, technological advancements have
a potential and may lead to a high amount of crimes when not developed and used with security.
It has enhanced the cyber crimes that are today, one of the most common practised way of crime.
The technology up-gradation is must for the process of evolution and it leads to providing higher
value to the user and make process easy. But it gives opportunity to the IT specialist or even
common offenders to earn their money or get some secret information about someone or some
processes that are hidden with the help of a single click and even that is not needed in some cases
of low security level. Due to this, the innovation of the technological tools must be involved with
the assurance of security to the data (Fenimore, 2019). Government can also put some criteria for
maintaining a strong value of these upgrades.
CAARP evaluating method :

IT is a model that provides a way to evaluate some particular sources and analysing the
difference according to the four of its criteria :
Criteria The effects of local area crime
on the minds of people
(Chopin and Beauregard,
2020)
A taxonomy of cyber harms :
defining the impacts of cyber
attacks and understanding how
they propagate
Currency The article was published in
November of 2021
This article was published in
2018
Authority This author of this article were
- Christian Dustmann and
Francesco Fasani
This article was given by -
Agrafiotis, I., Nurse, J.R.,
Goldsmith, M., Creese, S. and
Upton, D., 2018.
Accuracy The given data in the article is
accurate when considering
aspects of local people
The accuracy is justified
through using some real lfe
examples.
Reliability The source and information is
reliable as the problems of the
topic was considered with the
involvement of the local
people that are most prone to
this activity.
It can be said as a reliable data
as the information provided
connects with the problems of
the real world (Priestman,
2018)
Purpose The purpose of this article was
to identify the crime related
activities and society that are
being negatively impacted
The purpose of the article was
to show the importance of the
matter of cyber crime that are
being practised commonly in
the society to find measures

TASK 2
Summary of key findings from both of the articles :
From the above articles it is being analysed that the crimes are increasing at a fast pace.
There are different types of crimes that are being practised in the society. The common people of
the society are very concerned about this matter and want the government to take actions against
it. When the data of the crimes that had happened in UK and other European country gets
compared with the related crime rate of other parts of the world, it is concluded that it is less
prone to the possession of crime (Raneri, 2018). But the concern of the people tells that crime is
being practised and delivered to the people other than the ways of direct victimisation. There are
certain types of laws that are made with the avoiding the crime activities. They have different
types of punishments of different laws that are according to the extend at which the illegal
activities have been done. The punishments can lead to fines, imprisonment or even hang to
death in the case of serious crime such as rape. Local people are the people of the common
society that lives together in a colony. These are generally medium class income people. The
offenders focus on this community of people as they have less security of their assets and also
have less knowledge that makes an easy task for the offenders to implement the crime activities.
Due to this, these people are most concerned and want measures to avoid these type of activities.
This lead to have a negative impact on the behaviour and health of the people when they face,
are prone or are afraid from any type of crime that can happen to them, their family members or
loved ones. The behavioural changes that can be seen due to the fearfulness are – avoiding to go
not when not necessary, keeping self defence object with them or wear clothes that are according
to the terms of the society. It has been also analysed form the articles that the people are
experiencing deep negative effects on their mental health due to the related issue. The mental
health have a strong impact on the health of people. For example, - The bombings happened in
London on July 7th 2005, there were high number of recorded health disease due to low well
being of mental health (Xu, Pennington-Gray and Kim, 2019). This stadns a threat for the
government and responsible authorities to build and implement measures to avoid the crimes in
the market.
The technology up gradation is the innovation of new products or services in the market.
These are made with the motive of giving people more amount of satisfaction value and make
the certain process easy and efficient. This also decreases the need of human resource in a task as

the process become automatic without the involvement of different people and steps. The
engineers and IT experts of the world try to make new technological innovatory tools and
techniques that can make process smooth and will be adopted by the society by filling their needs
and wants. Whereas the related products and services of technology does not only have a positive
impact but a negative too. There are many types of crimes that are practised in the society by
using these technological tools. Cyber crimes are becoming a most commonly practised way of
crime in the world. These are the activities that work in finding loopholes in the technologies and
analyse the wrong way of advantage they can take of it. For example the data of the users are
analysed from a source, which is then used to analyse details of the related person (LaFree,
2018). Then the offenders make phone call to the person and make them believe in him / her by
identifying themselves as some trusted person or worker of a well known business entity
( generally the banks in which they have their accounts). Than they ask them about the opt they
get on their mobile phones or other technology equipments. This is basic and most commonly
used type of cyber crime. There are many different ways which are not even identified by the
governments that the offenders use. These crimes are done with the motive of attaining money or
secured / private information. The companies are forced to use the evolving technology in their
operations to compete with the market and have a competitive advantage from other organisation
in the market that deal in the related type of product or service. These companies invest a lot of
money in their technological up gradation, even though these technologies comes with a risk to
be prone to cyber crimes. Due to this, high amount of security is demanded in the new
technology that are not possible or hard to be cracked by the hackers. The online website on
which people shop should make their website strong to be hacked as it have the data of the
people that are robbed by the hackers to collect data and information of the people that helps
them in the process of cyber crime (Weisburd, 2018).
A comparison between academic papers including purpose, methodology and results :
The first article is about the concern of common crimes that are harming the local people
of the society. It is made with the motive of making the society know about the impact that these
crimes have on the health of the people. Whereas the second article is about the taxonomy of
cyber crime to define their roles and the different types of ways in which they are being highly
practised in the society. It is made with the motive of attracting the concern of common people

and responsible authorities towards the new way of practising crime using the technological
innovation tools and techniques (Sydes, Wickes and Zahnow, 2021). The primary type of data is
used in the first article. Whereas the second article is based on some secondary data. The article
of impact of crimes on the minds of people concludes a larger topic where as the the second
articles of typology is solely based on a type of crime that is known as cyber crime and is
concluded of the information and way It is being practised in the article.
The providing of information on the base and with the help of already published data is
easy, as it only needs to be paraphrased. The data must be based on some different sources to
provide a detailed and accurate information. The article must be effective to impact on the
minds and perception of the readers (Atems, 2020). There should be a strong conclusion out of
the articles. Real data must be shown to make the readers believe in the writings. It should also
be concluded of the reasons and strategies that can be used to avoid the crime or the subject of
the articles.

CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been concluded that crimes are the illegal activity that has a
harmful impact on the lives of people of the society. They lead to punishments according to the
extend they break the rules and practice illegal activities. They have been a part of the society
from the starting of the era of the world. With the evolving of world, the crimes are also being
evolved. New types and ways of practising crime are identified by the offenders to be able to do
them efficiently without getting caught by the government authorities as the government is the
responsible body to work on minimizing the catching the offenders of crime.

REFERENCES:
Books and Journals:
White, R., Perrone, S. and Howes, L.M., 2019. Crime, criminality and criminal justice.
John, H., 2018. Crime and capitalization: Toward a developmental theory of street crime in
America. In Developmental theories of crime and delinquency (pp. 287-308). Routledge.
Radoini, A., 2020. Cyber-crime during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Freedom from Fear, 2020(16),
pp.6-10.
Robert, A., 2018. Stability and change in crime over the life course: A strain theory explanation.
In Developmental theories of crime and delinquency (pp. 101-132). Routledge.
Zehr, H., 2019. Crime and the development of modern society: Patterns of criminality in
nineteenth century Germany and France. Routledge.
Taylor, I., 2019. Crime in context: A critical criminology of market societies. Routledge.
Fenimore, D.M., 2019. Mapping harmspots: An exploration of the spatial distribution of crime
harm. Applied geography. 109. p.102034.
Priestman, M., 2018. Crime fiction: from Poe to the present. Oxford University Press.
Chopin, J. and Beauregard, E., 2020. The unusual victim: Understanding the specific crime
processes and motivations for elderly sexual homicide. Journal of forensic sciences, 65(2),
pp.535-543.
Raneri, D., 2018. Enhancing forensic investigation through the use of modern three-dimensional
(3D) imaging technologies for crime scene reconstruction. Australian journal of forensic
sciences. 50(6). pp.697-707.
Xu, Y.H., Pennington-Gray, L. and Kim, J., 2019. The sharing economy: A geographically
weighted regression approach to examine crime and the shared lodging sector. Journal of travel
research. 58(7). pp.1193-1208.
LaFree, G., 2018. Losing legitimacy: Street crime and the decline of social institutions in
America. Routledge.
Weisburd, D., 2018. From criminals to criminal contexts: Reorienting crime prevention research
and policy. In Crime & social organization (pp. 197-216). Routledge.
Sydes, M., Wickes, R. and Zahnow, R., 2021. Distance to crime. Crime and Disorder in
Community Context, p.63.
Atems, B., 2020. Identifying the dynamic effects of income inequality on crime. Oxford Bulletin
of Economics and Statistics. 82(4). pp.751-782.
The effects of local area crime on the minds of people [online] available through
<www.ucl.ac.uk.>
A taxonomy of cyber-harms: Defining the impacts of cyber-attacks and understanding how they
propagate, 2018. [Online] Available through: <https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:7e86c83a-a7fc-
4703-9916-1363302eb55b>./