Perceptions of personal safety among older Australians.

Introduction: There is public perception, partly attributable to the media, that older people are disproportionately the victims of crime and are greatly concerned for their personal safety.

Objectives: To identify at a population level older people's perceptions of their personal safety in their home and separately in their neighbourhood, and the predictors of feeling safe in each setting.

Methods: Logistic regression analysis of responses from randomly selected older Australians (65+ years) living independently in the community (n= 8881) to a cross-sectional telephone general health survey.

Results: The vast majority of respondents, although higher in men, reported feeling safe in their home (96%) and neighbourhood (92%) 'all' or 'most' of the time. Feeling safe did not decline with age. Significant predictors of feeling safe 'all' the time were identified and some gender differences were noted.

Conclusions: The perception that older people are greatly concerned with their personal safety is not supported by these findings.