This article argues that metal detectors bestow an organizational stigma to schools. One symptom of this is students’ heightened level of fear at school. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) and a matched-pair design, this study finds that metal detectors are negatively correlated with students’ sense of safety at school, net of the level of violence at school. However, this association is different for urban students. The negative association between metal detectors and urban students’ sense of safety is 13% less than what it is for students attending suburban or rural schools.
Ballard, C. ( 1998). Violence prevention in Georgia’s rural public school systems: Perceptions of school superintendents. Southern Rural Sociology, 14, 91-109.
2.
Brown, B. ( 2005). Controlling crime and delinquency in the schools: An exploratory study of student perceptions of school security measures. Journal of School Violence, 4(4), 105-125.
3.
Chantala, K. ( 2003, July 28-29). Introduction to analyzing Add Health data . Prepared for the Add Health Users Workshop, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD.
4.
Chantala, K., & Tabor, J. ( 1999). Strategies to perform a design-based analysis using the Add Health data (National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health). Chapel HillCarolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
5.
Cheurprakobkit, S., & Bartsch, R.A. ( 2005). Security measures on school crime in Texas middle and high schools. Educational Research, 47, 235-250.
6.
Demuth, S., & Brown, S.L. ( 2004). Family structure, family processes, and adolescent delinquency: The significance of parental absence versus parental gender. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 41(1), 58-81.
7.
Devers, C.E., Dewett, T., Mishina, Y., & Belsito, C.A. ( 2009). A general theory of organizational stigma. Organization Science, 20, 154-171.
8.
Dinkes, R., Kemp, J., & Baum, K. ( 2009). Indicators of school crime and safety: 2008 (NCES 2009-022/NCJ 226343). Washington, DC: National Center for Education Statistics, Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education, and Bureau of Justice Statistics, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice.
9.
Ferraraccio, M. ( 1999). Metal detectors in the public schools: Fourth Amendment concerns. Journal of Law and Education, 28, 209-229.
10.
Gastic, B. ( 2006). At what price? Safe school policies and their unintentional consequences for at-risk students. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco.
11.
Ginsberg, C. ( 1993). Violence-related attitudes and behaviors of high school students-New York City. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report , 42, 773-777.
12.
Green, M.W. ( 1999). The appropriate and effective use of security technologies in U.S. schools: A guide for schools and law enforcement agencies (NIJ 178265) . Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, National Institute of Justice.
13.
Harris, K.M., Florey, F., Tabor, J., Bearman, P.S., Jones, J., & Udry, J.R. ( 2003). The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health: Research design. Retrieved March 22, 2006, from http://www.cpc.unc.edu/projects/addhealth/design
14.
Hoffmann, J.P., & Dufur, M.J. ( 2008). Family and school capital effects on delinquency: Substitutes or complements? Sociological Perspectives, 51(1), 29-62.
15.
Kitsantas, A., Ware, H.W., & Martinez-Arias, R. (2004). Students’ perceptions of school safety: Effects by community, school environment, and substance use variables. Journal of Early Adolescence, 24, 412-430.
16.
Leuven, E., & Sianesi, B. (n.d.). PSMATCH2: Stata module to perform full Mahalanobis and propensity score matching, common support graphing, and covariate imbalance testing. Version 1.2.3. Retrieved June 9, 2009, from http://ideas.repec.org/c/boc/bocode/s432001.html
17.
Mayer, M.J., & Leone, P.E. ( 1999). A structural analysis of school violence and disruption: Implications for creating safer schools. Education and Treatment of Children, 22, 333-356.
McDonough, S. ( 2008). Safety cultivates fear? The unintended consequences of school surveillance measures. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Social Problems, Boston.
20.
Schreck, C.J., & Miller, J.M. ( 2003). Sources of fear of crime at school: What is the relative contribution of disorder, individual characteristics, and school security?Journal of School Violence, 2(4), 57-79.
21.
Schreck, C.J., Miller, J.M., & Gibson, C.L. ( 2003). Trouble in the school yard: A study of the risk factors of victimization at school. Crime & Delinquency, 49, 460-484.
22.
Sheehan, K., Kim, L.E., & Galvin, J.P. ( 2004). Urban children’s perceptions of violence. Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, 158(1), 74-77.
23.
Stuart, E.A. ( 2007). Estimating causal effect using school-level data sets . Educational Research, 36, 187-198.
24.
Thompkins, D.E. ( 2000). School violence: Gangs and a culture of fear. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 567(1), 54-71.
25.
Twemlow, S.W., Fonagy, P., & Sacco, F.C. ( 2002). Feeling safe in school. Smith College Studies in Social Work, 72, 303-326.
26.
Udry, J.R. ( 2003). The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), Waves I & II, 1994-1996; Wave III, 2001-2002 [Machine-readable data file and documentation]. Chapel Hill: Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
27.
Wilcox, P., May, D.C., & Roberts, S.D. ( 2006). Student weapon possession and the "fear and victimization hypothesis": Unraveling the temporal order. Justice Quarterly , 23, 502-529.
28.
Williams, J.S., Singh, B.K., & Singh, B.B. ( 1994). Urban youth, fear of crime, and resulting defensive actions . Adolescence, 29, 323-330.
