Shoplifting causes serious losses to not only stores but also to consumers and society as a whole. There need to be effective society-wide measures to control shoplifting due to its characteristic of playing the role as a stepping stone to induce more serious crimes. However, there is a lack of research on shoplifting in Korea, especially the research analyzing situational factors to suggest effective alternative measures for shoplifting prevention. Therefore, the current study surveyed teenagers, the group known to be the most frequent shoplifters, to see their perception of effectiveness of the situational crime prevention methods used in stores.
The result showed that the teenagers found only some of the prevention methods effective, including CCTV, Electronic Article Surveillance(EAS), minimization of blind areas, and watchful clerks. However, factors such as the number of doors and their accessibility and presence of security guards were not perceived to be very effective. Using the result of the survey, this study suggests ways to utilize situational crime prevention methods more effectively to deter shoplifting.