Objectives

This study investigates the deterrent effects of incremental levels of guardianship on residential burglary and assesses how burglars differ from non-burglars in terms of their perceptions of opportunities for burglary.

Methods

In a virtual reality experiment, 181 incarcerated burglars and 172 non-burglars (university students) were tasked to appraise a virtual neighbourhood in search of a burglary target. During the appraisal process, participants were exposed to different levels of guardianship, ranging from the mere presence of a guardian to an intervening guardian.

Results

The presence of a guardian deterred both burglars and non-burglars alike, with only negligible incremental effects for levels of guardianship. For burglars, guardianship increased the perceived likelihood of being caught and the perceived level of social cohesion, whereas it decreased neighbourhood attractiveness. The burglars differed from the non-burglars in terms of how they appraised the virtual neighbourhood, clearly reflecting differences in expertise between both groups.

Conclusions

With respect to residential burglary, the results suggest that guardians—in line with the original notion of guardianship developed by Cohen and Felson (American Sociological Review, 44(4), 588–608, 1979)—serve as a deterrent simply by being present.

中文翻译：

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仅仅有非正式监护人就可以阻止窃贼：一项虚拟现实研究

目标

本研究调查了监护权的递增水平对住宅入室盗窃的威慑作用，并评估了窃贼与非窃贼在对入室盗窃机会的看法方面有何不同。

方法

在虚拟现实实验中，181 名被监禁的窃贼和 172 名非窃贼（大学生）受命评估虚拟社区以寻找窃贼目标。在评估过程中，参与者会受到不同程度的监护，从单纯的监护人到干预的监护人不等。

结果

监护人的存在阻止了窃贼和非窃贼，对监护水平的增量影响可以忽略不计。对于窃贼来说，监护权增加了被抓获的可能性和社会凝聚力的感知水平，而它降低了邻里的吸引力。窃贼与非窃贼在评估虚拟社区的方式上有所不同，这清楚地反映了两组之间专业知识的差异。

结论

关于入室盗窃，结果表明，监护人——与 Cohen 和 Felson 提出的最初监护权概念一致（美国社会学评论，44 (4), 588–608, 1979）——只要在场就可以起到威慑作用.