Background There is general agreement that the frequency of crime decreases with the distance from the offender’s home. By way of exception to this distance decay pattern, the buffer zone hypothesis states that offenders avoid offending very close to home. The purpose of the present study was to assess the validity of this hypothesis. Methods We conducted a systematic literature review of 4 bibliographic databases, in which we identified 108 studies on criminal distance decay, from which we selected 33 studies that include sufficient information to assess the existence of the buffer zone. Based on the full text of the research articles, we created a measure indicating whether the study supported or rejected the hypothesis and a measure summarizing the relative quality of the evidence as either weak-medium or strong. Results Of the 33 studies, 22 rejected the buffer zone hypothesis and 11 supported it. Across the whole sample, the methodological rigor of the studies was limited, but unrelated to whether the buffer zone hypothesis was supported or rejected. Conclusions Based on the available evidence the buffer zone hypothesis has gained limited support. We conclude by making recommendations on how to report data on the home-crime distance and suggesting a testing methodology for future research.

中文翻译：

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罪犯会避免在家附近冒犯吗？对缓冲区假设的系统评价

背景技术人们普遍认为，犯罪频率随着离犯罪者家的距离的增加而降低。除此距离衰减模式外，缓冲区假说指出，犯罪者应避免在离家很近的地方犯罪。本研究的目的是评估该假设的有效性。方法我们对4个书目数据库进行了系统的文献综述，在其中我们鉴定了108个关于犯罪距离衰减的研究，从中我们选择了33个研究，这些研究包括足够的信息来评估缓冲区的存在。基于研究文章的全文，我们创建了一个指示该研究是否支持或拒绝该假设的度量，并总结了证据的相对质量（弱或强）的度量。33项研究结果 22个拒绝了缓冲区假设，而11个则支持了这一假设。在整个样本中，研究的方法学严格性是有限的，但与是否支持或拒绝缓冲区假设无关。结论基于现有的证据，缓冲区的假设获得了有限的支持。最后，我们就如何报告家庭犯罪距离的数据提出了建议，并提出了用于未来研究的测试方法。