TY  - JOUR
PY  - 1996//
TI  - Violent Crime Rate Studies in Philosophical Context: A Destructive Testing Approach to Heat and Southern Culture of Violence Effects
JO  - Journal of personality and social psychology
A1  - Anderson, Craig A.
A1  - Anderson, Kathryn B.
SP  - 740
EP  - 756
VL  - 70
IS  - 4
N2  - The logic behind the translation of conceptual hypotheses into testable propositions was illustrated with the heat hypothesis. The destructive testing philosophy was introduced and applied. This consists of first showing that a predicted empirical relation exists, then attempting to break that relation by adding competitor variables. The key question in destructive testing is "How difficult was it to break the relation?" This approach was used to analyze the heat effect on violent crime rates (Study 1) and on White violent crime arrest rates (Study 2) in U.S. cities. One competitor variable was the particular focus of analysis: southern culture of violence. The heat hypothesis was supported by highly significant correlations between the warmth of a city and its violence rate. This heat effect survived multiple destructive tests. Some support for the southern culture effect was also found, but this effect was more easily broken. (Abstract Adapted from Source: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1996. Copyright © 1996 by the American Psychological Association)  Crime Rates Violence Rates Temperature Factors Weather Factors Caucasian Offender Caucasian Crime Caucasian Violence Caucasian Adult Southern Violence Southern Subculture Regional Factors Violence Causes Crime Causes Adult Offender Adult Violence Sociocultural Factors 06-00<p />
LA  - en
SN  - 0022-3514
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/
ID  - ref1
ER  -