Caregivers’ Perceived Spatial Vulnerability to Child Disappearance in Children’s Routine Activity Spaces: Evidence from Four Communities in Xi’an, China

Child disappearance poses significant challenges to child safety and family well-being, yet limited fine-grained data constrain investigations into disappearance-related vulnerabilities in routine urban environments. This study examines caregivers’ perceived spatial vulnerability to child disappearance using field survey data from four communities in Xi’an, China, purposively selected to capture differences in community types and built-environment characteristics. Based on 278 valid questionnaires concerning children aged 0–6 years, we analyze children’s daily outdoor activity duration and spatial patterns, assess caregivers’ perceived vulnerability across everyday activity spaces, and examine associated environmental factors through the framework of Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED). Results indicate that: (1) Children spend an average of 110.9 min outdoors daily, with activity duration varying across age groups and communities. Their activities are concentrated in residential spaces on weekdays and extend to parks, squares, and shopping malls on weekends. (2) Caregivers report relatively high perceived vulnerability to child disappearance, with an overall mean score of 3.44 on a five-point scale and variations across community and individual characteristics. (3) Perceived vulnerability differs across spatial settings, with concerns associated with parks, squares, amusement parks, community roads, shopping malls, and markets. Caregivers’ concerns primarily involve child abduction, children being attracted by surrounding objects or activities, children’s visibility being obstructed by physical objects, and other concerns, including children getting lost. These concerns are associated with nine environmental and contextual factors: high pedestrian flow, multiple blind spots, unfamiliarity with the space, poor environmental quality, the presence of strangers, limited surveillance, large spatial scale, low lighting, and high spatial openness. The findings highlight how environmental characteristics interact with spatial contexts to shape caregivers’ perceptions, providing insights for child-sensitive public-space design and child-friendly community planning.