Acknowledgments:

Although there is a large potential of citizen capital in fighting crime and creating safer neighborhoods, in reality, only a small fraction of citizens is actively participating. This study examines the relationship between different types of actual participation behavior in the police domain from a citizen's stance and 3 different but interconnected psychological drivers: the attitude toward citizen participation, moral values, and moral emotions. A total of 217 Dutch citizens filled out an online questionnaire, assessing these drivers and the actual participatory actions they engaged in over the past year. The results show that 4 broad categories of participation behavior can be distinguished: social control (e.g., correcting others regarding their behavior); responsive participation (e.g., calling the police); collaborative participation (e.g., meeting with a police officer); and detection (e.g., joining a neighborhood watch). As expected, moral values had an indirect influence on participation via attitude and moral emotions. The attitude toward citizen participation was positively related to all four types of reported behavior, while the influence of moral emotions only related to social control and responsive behavior. These results can be used in the design and testing of interventions to stimulate citizen participation.

Aided by the growth of Internet and social media, citizens increasingly organize themselves to communally increase safety in their own neighbourhood. In this context, a prominent type of online self-organization includes online neighbourhood watches. In an exploratory case-study, 214 citizens of one neighbourhood in a medium-sized city in the Netherlands were asked in a door-to-door survey whether they currently were a member of an online neighbourhood watch. Subsequently, nonmembers were asked whether they would consider becoming a member. Departing from the Community Engagement Theory developed for the domain of physical safety, we examined to what extent both membership and membership orientation were influenced by psychological drivers on the individual, community and institutional level. Results showed that current membership was associated with drivers on the individual level (lower risk perception and higher response efficacy) and community level (lower sense of community and more previous community participation), but not the institutional level (trust in the police). Furthermore, the willingness to become a member was related to individual response efficacy only. These insights can be used by e.g. the police in their communication with citizens on online platforms, as well as when aiming to further stimulate these initiatives.

Citizens are increasingly expected to take a more participatory role in society, which increases the need for them to be knowledgeable about a wide range of uncertain risks and to properly prepare themselves in case these risks become reality. To date, most attention regarding risk preparedness has focused on natural hazards. In the past decade, however, human-made safety risks have gained notoriety in the public's eye. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the psychological drivers on an individual, community and institutional level of the Community Engagement Theory also apply to the context of social safety hazards such as crime. The study was conducted via an online survey. In total, 1245 Dutch citizens who were already a member of the citizen panel of their municipality at the time of data collection participated in the online study. The results of this research show that the Community Engagement Theory is not only applicable for natural hazards, but also for human-made risks such as crime. Psychological drivers of all three levels, individual, community, and marginally institutional level, are relevant in explaining the willingness to report and intervene when witnessing a crime. This research gives insight and guidance for policy makers and practitioners regarding stimulating reporting and intervening behavior of crime, and citizens information-gathering.

Table of contents Chapter 1: General introduction Chapter 2: Citizen participation in the police domain: the role of citizens' attitude and morality Chapter 3: Witnessing a crime: citizen intervention and the role of morality Chapter 4: Community resilience and crime prevention: Applying the Community Engagement Theory to the risk of crime Chapter 5: Why do citizens become a member of an online neighborhood watch? The influence of individual-, community-, and institutional-related psychological drivers on membership Chapter 6: Making citizens go that extra mile: The influence of crime television shows on willingness to report to the police