A new Web tool could help measure subjective impressions of
urban environments, which may have consequences for social behaviors.
The “broken-windows theory,” which was propounded by two
Harvard University researchers in the early 1980s, holds that urban “disorder”
— visible signs of neglect, such as broken windows — actually promotes crime,
initiating a vicious feedback loop. The theory was the basis for former New
York mayor Rudy Giuliani’s crackdown on petty crime, but it’s come under sharp
criticism from some social scientists. One of the difficulties in evaluating
the theory is that it’s hard to quantify something as subjective as visible
disorder.