<P> Yet the relationship between fear of crime and mass media is unclear, at least in its causal ordering . To put the dilemma in simple terms: do people fear crime because a lot of crime is being shown on television, or does television just provide footage about crimes because people fear crime and want to see what's going on? The complex nature of crime could allow the media to exploit social naivety, covering crime not only selective, but also distorting the everyday world of crime . Some say the media contribute to the climate of fear that is created, because the actual frequency of victimisation is a tiny fraction of potential crime . </P> <P> With crime accounting for up to 25 per cent of news coverage, the quality and angle of the coverage becomes an issue . The media displays violent crime disproportionately, whilst neglecting minor crimes . The reality is violent crime has been declining in the past 10 years The profile of offenders in the media is distorted, causing misunderstanding of criminal offending . </P> <P> Unfortunately, however, despite an abundant literature on media effects--particularly the' mean world' hypothesis--little work has been done into how representations, imagery and symbols of crime circulate in society, transmitted and transformed by multiple actors with a wide array of effects, only to translate into personal fears about crime . Perhaps future work will take account of the transmission mechanisms through which representations, beliefs and attitudes about societal risks are propagated in different social and cultural contexts . </P> <P> Fear of crime can also be understood from a social constructionist perspective . The term and concept of fear of crime did not, for example, enter the public or political lexicon until the mid-1960s . That is not to say individuals did not fear crime victimization prior to this period, clearly they did at various points in history to varying degrees . However it demonstrates that fear of crime only became part of a political economy when researchers began to measure and analyse it under the auspice of The US President's Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice which reported in 1967 Once fear of crime had a name it could be deployed as a political tactic in a law and order politics . It also became something that citizens could experience as an emotional response to the threat of victimisation . The formation of a' fear of crime feedback loop' then allowed more citizens to be surveyed as fearful, more politicians to be able to use crime fear as a political issue, security products to be sold on the back of crime fear and so on in an ever - increasing spiral that popularised crime fear . Moreover, once citizens were seen as being motivated by concerns about crime fear of crime could be used as a responsibilising technique to activate citizens to conduct themeselves or consume products in ways that reduce their vulnerability to crime victimisation . This approach to understanding fear of crime does not deny the experiences of individuals who fear crime victimisation but suggests that such experiences have to be understood as being intimately connected to broader socio - political contexts . </P>

Which of the following is not a major influence on the level of fear regarding serious crime