Social Altruism, Cynicism, and the "Good Community"

After this weeks reading I feel that I am still attempting to process all of Sampson's fancy vocabulary. When the topic of "minorities" is brought up each one of us immediately has a color or a race in mind. What a minority means to me in terms of my emphasis of Spanish is, of course, a Latino person. Depending on where you find yourself in the United States the minority with the largest population group is very well known. For instance in our very own St. George Latinos account for the largest minority group (see figure A) —>1. Latinos are a growing race in this country which is why it is relevant for me, a person who wants to go into the medical field, to learn anything that can help me better serve those specific individuals. 

Further along into the text Sampson's studies show a clear pattern with altruistic communities that exhibit significantly lower homicide rates, crime rates, teenage births, and better overall health and wellbeing of adolescents and children. Where altruism was seen at a higher rate the wellbeing of a child was higher as well. As mentioned above teen birth rates were also found to be correlated with altruism. And Sampson claims a "direct link between neighborhood collective efficacy and lower rates of sexual behavior among teens."(228) —> 2. However, as I have stated in my previous blog post I do not believe that collective efficacy or altruisim can be used as measurement in the same way when it comes to Latino populations. 

I conducted my own little research and found a quote from Sampson himself stating that "increases in immigration [referring to Latinos in the U.S.] at the neighborhood level [leads] to decreases in crime."—> 3. If, however, lower crime rates raise altruism and collective efficacy then why do teen pregnancy rates amongst Latino women not correlate with the supposed level of collective efficacy that is supposed to exist (see figure B) —> 4. Because immigrants tend to immigrate to the same neighborhoods and choose to live amongst their own kind I would like to see a study conducted on the level of collective efficacy and altruism versus the teen pregnancy rate. Although more research does need to be conducted to further prove my little theory this is what I found correlated with this weeks assigned reading. 

List of References:

1 - CityData for St. George, UT 

2 - Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect

3 - The Neighborhood Effect from The Chronicle of Higher Education

4 - U.S. Department of Health & Human Services - Utah Adolescent Reproductive Health Facts

Figure A. 

Figure B.