A study of the determinants of reporting crime to the police among Chinese immigrants

Previous research has revealed that the likelihood of an individual reporting a criminal victimization to the police is contingent upon individual-level and incident-level factors. Targeting Chinese immigrants in Houston, Texas, we examine predictors that influence Chinese immigrants' decision to report crimes-both personal and property-to the police. In addition to individual- specific and incident-specific factors, we also employed two immigrant-specific predictors of crime reporting-acculturation and knowledge about the American criminal justice system. Results indicate that greater acculturation is associated with higher levels of crime reporting, but knowledge about the system has seemingly little impact.