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Temperature and firearm violence in four United States cities: Testing competing hypotheses

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English


Public Access Version Available on: January 18, 2026, 12:00 AM
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  • Alternative Title:
    Inj Prev
  • Personal Author:
  • Description:
    Introduction

    Firearm violence is a major public health issue in the United States. There is growing evidence that firearm violence is associated with higher ambient temperatures. The aim of this study was to test competing hypotheses that could explain associations between temperature and firearm violence: temperature-aggression theory and routine activities theory.

    Methods

    We examined associations between elevated daily temperatures and shooting incidents in four United States cities: Chicago, Illinois; Cincinnati, Ohio; New York, New York; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Temperature was operationalized using two different measures: daily maximum temperature and deviations of the daily maximum temperature from 30-year averages. Generalized linear autoregressive moving average models related temperature to shooting incidence while controlling for seasonal effects.

    Results

    As maximum daily temperature deviates from the expected, there was an association with increased shooting incidents in all four cities (e.g., New York: b = 0.014, 95% CI = 0.011, 0.017). An interaction term created by multiplying daily maximum temperature by the daily difference of maximum temperature from a 30-year average was also found to have a positive association in all four cities (e.g., New York: b = 0.020, 95% CI = 0.016, 0.025).

    Discussion

    These findings accord with previous studies demonstrating a positive relationship between temperature and firearm violence and further support temperature-aggression theory as the primary causal mechanism.

  • Source:
    Inj Prev.
  • DOI:
  • Pubmed ID:
    39025672
  • Pubmed Central ID:
    PMC11747920
  • Document Type:
    Journal Article
  • Funding:
    R49 CE003094/CE/NCIPC CDC HHSUnited States/
  • Collection(s):
  • Main Document Checksum:
    urn:sha-512:bb616b583388287b8f40006480c79c8379caedb216d85e34660194bd85a87615666ff45836342d81a3b9fdf7d22b3ffba69f55b1529cdf1cb5f869ae912f0c11
  • File Type:
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File Language:
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