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Social Distance and Social Change: How Neighborhoods Change Over Time View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Carolina Digital Repository Social Distance and Social Change: How Neighborhoods Change over Time John R. Hipp A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Sociology Chapel Hill 2006 Approved by Advisor: Kenneth A. Bollen Reader: Barbara Entwisle Reader: Kenneth Land Reader: Thomas Mroz Reader: Francois Nielsen © 2006 John R. Hipp All rights reserved ii Abstract John R. Hipp: Social Distance and Social Change: How Neighborhoods Change over Time (Under the direction of Kenneth A. Bollen) Two key theoretical themes guided my exploration of neighborhood change. First, I utilized the classic sociological notion of social distance in testing its determinants and viewing its effect on neighborhood change over time. I measured social distance in various manners: 1) racial/ethnic differences, 2) a composite of several characteristics (including racial/ethnic, socio-economic, and demographic), or 3) the consolidated inequality created by difference along both racial/ethnic and socio-economic differences simultaneously. Second, I built an explicit micro-level theory of household residential mobility decisions to explain the generation of the structural characteristics that theories posit cause neighborhood crime. I found that social distance had important implications for neighborhoods. Using a multi-level, longitudinal sample of the American Housing Survey (AHS) I found that individual-level social distance along multiple characteristics helps explain neighborhood satisfaction: this suggests the importance of focusing on the fit of the household with the neighborhood. Dynamic analyses using this same sample showed that racial/ethnic heterogeneity explains crime rates four years later. Fixed effects analyses using a sample of census tracts in eleven cities found that changing ethnic heterogeneity over the decade is positively related to changing crime rates. These same fixed effects analyses showed that increasing inequality between African-Americans and whites is positively related to the change in various official crime rates. iii My theoretical model helped explain the change in neighborhood structural characteristics. Using the AHS sample, I found that perceived crime in a block increases general residential mobility. This theoretical model also predicted and found that the presence of more homeowners on a block reduces perceived crime four years later in dynamic models. While residential instability had no effect on crime four years later in cross-lagged models, more vacant units in the block are positively related to perceived crime four years later. This suggests a possible manner in which residential mobility may affect neighborhood crime rates. I also found using the AHS sample that higher levels of block perceived crime creates racial/ethnic residential transformation by increasing the likelihood that African-Americans and Latinos will move into the block, and reducing the likelihood that whites will move in. iv In memory of my father, and to my mother. The spirit I inherited from him and the sisu I inherited from her helped me through this process v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My years in the graduate program at UNC have been the most rewarding of my life to date. This time period has combined intellectual stimulation, with research exploration, with friends and colleagues who are genuinely wonderful people. Most important for my intellectual growth and stimulation has been the guidance of my advisor, Ken Bollen. I feel deeply fortunate to have had him as an advisor: he provided the perfect balance of allowing me the freedom to pursue intellectual interests along with the safety net of an intellectual resource to turn to in times of uncertainty. Ken has the unusual combination of incredible brilliance and knowledge, along with a generosity to always be available to impart that knowledge, along with an ironic sense of humor and a genuine warmth and compassion that make him both a wonderful teacher as well as person. Thank you, Ken. I also feel privileged to have had an esteemed dissertation committee, and they provided amazing intellectual input. Barbara Entwisle always went the extra mile to provide suggestions and insight throughout my time here: whether it was feedback during courses, insight and suggestions during the master’s thesis, or comments and challenges during the dissertation process. Ken Land provided key insights into methodological strategies, as well as substantive suggestions regarding criminology and demographic issues. Tom Mroz provided key insight from an econometric perspective, and challenged me to think in new and useful ways. Francois Nielsen challenged me to think carefully about conceptual issues, and provided useful suggestions regarding measurement issues. vi My years at UNC were made particularly memorable by the close ties I fostered with my fellow cohort members—all of them provided intellectual stimulation as well as warm friendship. Of particular importance is Kraig Beyerlein, my fellow “pedestrian intellect”! We have grown in a parallel fashion as academics, and also together as a research team. We have gone from stumbling along blindly learning to do research, to learning our craft to the point of accomplishing several rewarding research projects while here, to now envisioning a future in which we embark on many more research enterprises together. Jeff Edmeades has been a wonderful colleague who has repeatedly helped in various manners, ranging from providing detailed feedback on drafts of chapters, to the more mundane tasks of dissertation formatting! While not a member of our cohort, Jeff’s wife Sunny provided many intellectual discussions of statistical issues from an econometric perspective. Cheol-Sung Lee was always a source of intellectual ideas and good humor, and provided feedback on drafts of chapters. Finally, Ben Fletcher was a colleague for several years who provided amazing intellectual insight and an ability to challenge conventional ways of thinking. While academia is likely not the path of choice for Ben, I will always cherish the conversations we had. But even more important than the intellectual stimulation these cohort members provided me is the wonderful friendship they provided. I have also benefited from intellectual stimulation and friendships from numerous other sources. Sharon Christ provided feedback on drafts of chapters, as well as many hours of interesting discussions of various statistical issues. Kammi Schmeer likewise provided insightful feedback on early drafts of chapters. Bob Faris was a fun lunch companion, provided theoretical insight, and, perhaps most importantly, began and cultivated my appreciation of Tar Heel basketball! Heather Krull was an always-cheery presence as we vii whiled away the hours working in Odum. Phil Kim and I shared many interesting conceptual discussions over coffee, not to mention stimulating discussions about Tar Heel baseball. Several other fellow graduate students provided both intellectual stimulation and enjoyable companionship, including Kristin Kenneavy, Lynn Owens, Jeremy Pienik, Darci Powell, Jeff Rosenthal and Steve Vaisey. I also experienced wonderful encounters with several faculty members not part of my committee. The tidbits of intellectual exchange I enjoyed with Howard Aldrich when he frequently stopped to chat with me at the coffee shop were a constant boost. Andy Perrin provided numerous opportunities to share theoretical and conceptual ideas, as well as the opportunity to collaborate on projects. Likewise, Guang Guo was a project collaborator who also provided numerous discussions of statistical issues. My time as a member of the Carolina Structural Equation Modeling group provides some particularly fond memories. While all the members of the group were brilliant and funny—including Ken, my advisor—two others particularly stand out. First, Patrick Curran was an amazingly generous source of information for me. Besides being a collaborator, Patrick was always generous with his time to counsel me on negotiating the perils and joys of the academic endeavor. Second, Dan Bauer was also a collaborator, but was also incredibly generous in his time and effort. Dan spent countless hours guiding me in learning how to write and how to do research. Several others have been important to me in this process. Kirk White helped me to negotiate the census bureau while doing my research work at the Triangle Census Research Data Center (TCRDC). Rodney Hodson was always generous in helping me with computer issues—now that I’m leaving, perhaps his lab computers will finally stop smoking! Amanda viii Henley’s generous help in tracking down various shape files has helped the geocoding involved in this dissertation. I have benefited from the geocoding wizardry of Bev Wilson and Karl Lauff at the Odum Institute. Sharon Morris at the Johns Hopkins University library provided data useful for geocoding the neighborhoods of Baltimore. I also benefited financially from the graduate school’s funding my final year of research with a dissertation fellowship, as well as a financial grant provided by the TCRDC allowing me to access the data there. I even benefited from my favorite coffee shops that provided a pleasant refuge to work: the Daily Grind, Caribou, and the resplendent Caffe Driade! A special word of thanks
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