Measuring small-area violent crime: a comparison of observed versus model-estimated crime rates and preterm birth

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Ariana N Gobaud, Columbia University; Michael Kramer, Emory University; Erin R Stearns, EpiMap; Danielle F Haley, Boston University
• Language: English
• Date: 2021-01-08
• Publisher: ELSEVIER SCIENCE INC
• Publication Version: Author Accepted Manuscript (After Peer Review)
• Copyright Statement: © 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
• License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2020.11.008
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: ANNALS OF EPIDEMIOLOGY
• Volume: 55
• Start Page: 27
• End Page: 33
• Keywords: Science & Technology; Life Sciences & Biomedicine; Public, Environmental & Occupational Health; Residence characteristics; Small-area data; Crime; Preterm birth

Abstract

Purpose: Research examining the association between crime and health outcomes has been hampered by a lack of reliable small-area (e.g., census tract or census block group) crime data. Our objective is to assess the accuracy of synthetically estimated crime indices for use in health research by using preterm birth as a case study. Methods: We used violent crime data reported by 47 law enforcement agencies in 15 counties in Atlanta, Georgia and compared them with commercially estimated crime rates from the same year to assess (1) how two measures of crime were correlated and (2) if the associations between violent crime rate indices and preterm birth (PTB) varied as a function of the source of crime index. To assess the association between violent crime and PTB, we used multilevel logistic regression and controlled for potential individual- and neighborhood-level confounders. Results: Violent crime, both estimated and observed, was positively correlated with poverty, neighborhood proportion Black, and neighborhood deprivation index; however, the association was stronger using estimated rates as compared with observed crime rates. The association between living in a high violent crime neighborhood and PTB was only consistent for white women across the two crime indices after covariate adjustment. For Black women, the association between living in a high violent crime neighborhood and PTB is systematically underestimated across all models when the estimated crime rate is used. Conclusions: There is evidence that model-estimated crime rates are not reliable proxies for crime in an urban area even when appropriate confounders are adjusted for.