Description:
This article reviews the Space-Time Budget method developed by Wikström and colleagues and particularly discusses its relevance for criminological research. The Space-Time Budget method is a data collection instrument aimed at recording, retrospectively, on an hour-by-hour basis, the whereabouts and activities of respondents during four days in the week before the interview. The method includes items about criminologically relevant events, such as offending and victimization. We demonstrate that the method can be very useful in criminology, because it enables the study of situational causes of crime and victimization, because it enables detailed measurement of theoretical concepts such as individual lifestyles and individual routine activities, and because it enables the study of adolescents’ whereabouts, which extends the traditional focus on residential neighborhoods. The present article provides the historical background of the method, explains how the method can be applied, presents validation results based on data from 843 secondary school students in the Netherlands and describes the methods’ strengths and weaknesses. Two case studies are summarized to illustrate the usefulness of the method in criminological research. The article concludes with some anticipated future developments and recommendations on further readings