Stalking Awareness

Over the last two decades, stalking has received increasingly widespread attention. The establishment of anti-stalking legislation has helped to spur interest in stalking research and the forensic assessment of stalkers. Popular representations of stalking have made the public more aware ofthis phenomenon. It has long been the responsibility of mental health professionals to provide assessments of and treatment for stalkers and their victims, and as criminal cases involving defendants charged with stalking become more common, it is now also the responsibility of legal professionals tobe knowledgeable about psychiatric aspects of stalking behavior and the risks that so often must be minimized through legal action or a combination of clinical and legal interventions. This volume provides a thorough overview of current scientific and clinical research about stalking, along withpractical guidance and original commentary from the Psychiatry and the Law Committee of the Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry, an organization recognized for its contributions to mental health literature. In addition to covering the most widely discussed scientific topics related to stalking,including classification of stalking behaviors, risk assessment and risk management of stalkers, and the stalking experience from the perspective of victims, this book examines celebrity and special target stalking, cyberstalking, forensic assessment, and juvenile and adolescent stalking. iStalking:Psychiatric Perspectives and Practical Approaches/i provides a novel and comprehensive contribution to a field in need of an up-to-date text, written from the vantage point of forensic psychiatrists who encounter stalkers and their victims in their distinct roles as treatment providers and forensicevaluators. The prism of stalking and the risks involved continue to fascinate and frighten. In pursuit of rounded coverage, the authors have incorporated findings from numerous studies and analyzed these findings from several theoretical perspectives. Every chapter has been written from the vantagepoint of a committee of nationally recognized forensic psychiatrists who offer their perspectives on this fascinating but complex topic. Mental health professionals, members of the judiciary, law enforcement professionals, media personnel, and the public will no doubt find this text to be aninformative and useful resource.

A gripping blend of memoir, investigation and expert analysis, Obsession takes a deep dive into the disturbing phenomenon of stalking.Journalist Nicole Madigan was stalked for over three years. The relentless and debilitating experience wreaked havoc in her personal and professional life, leaving her trapped in a constant state of fear and anxiety.Nicole uses her own story as an entry point to examine the psychology behind stalking behaviours and their impact on victim-survivors. Whether by a stranger, acquaintance or former partner, stalking can have a catastrophic effect on a victim-survivor's mental, social and financial wellbeing. At its worst, it can lead to physical violence, even death.In this timely and compelling enquiry, Madigan explores the blurred lines between romantic interest and obsession, admiration and fixation. Through expert consultation and the personal stories of other victim-survivors, she analyses society's attitude towards stalking and its role in popular culture, while highlighting the failings of the legal system in protecting victims.

Authors William R. Cupach and Brian H. Spitzberg synthesize the expanding multidisciplinary base of knowledge aboutnbsp;obsessive relational intrusion (ORI) and stalking, presenting a comprehensive scholarly consideration of these behaviors. Their inclusive approach is reflected in the breadth of research represented, including social, clinical and forensic psychology, psychiatry, counseling, communication, criminal justice, law enforcement, sociology, social work, threat assessment and management, and family studies. The work also draws upon the multidisciplinary scholarship on social and personal relationships. The chapters in this volume: *provide historical and definitional frames for studying unwanted relationship pursuit, and consider the role of such sources as the media, law, and social science research in shaping the contemporary multifaceted and multifarious conceptualizations of stalking; *elaborate the authors' assumption that much unwanted relationship pursuit owes to complications inherent in the processes of constructing and dismantling relationships, examine the factors that conspire to create slippage between two persons' conceptions of their "shared" relationship, and explore the cultural practices associated with relationship dissolution that tend to reinforce persistence in unwanted pursuit; *chart the topography of unwanted pursuit, offering a unique and comprehensive synthesis of relevant research bearing on several issues, and a review of the temporal stages and characteristics of stalking; *consider promising theories and variables for explaining the occurrence of unwanted pursuit; and *discuss the issues pertinent to threat assessment, managing unwanted pursuit and offering a comprehensive typology of victim consequences of pursuit. The volume concludes with thoughts about "correcting courtship." Drawing on the interpersonal competence literature, Cupach and Spitzberg speculate on ways in which enhancing relationship management skills could help diminish the incidence and debilitating consequences of ORI and stalking. With this work, the authors provide a clearer picture of the current state of knowledge about stalking, and in so doing, identify productive paths for scholarly inquiry and ultimately bolster the effectiveness of prevention and intervention efforts. The volume is destined to promote and publicize the multidisciplinary nature of stalking research such that cross-fertilization of interested fields might yield new and better insights. It will be required reading for the cross-disciplinary community of academics and professionals who are committed to understanding and responding to unwanted relationship pursuit and stalking.

Revealing the shocking and detailed accounts of how adult women stalk, sexually assault, and even rape adult men, this book portrays an eye-opening reality: women can act as aggressive predators and victimize men. Crimes of a sexual nature perpetrated by adult females against males constitute a serious problem in our society. A woman can rape a man, and this crime occurs far more often than most imagine. This book addresses an entire range of crimes beyond rape, however; stalking, sexual harassment, and sexual assault are all covered in detail. When Women Sexually Abuse Men: The Hidden Side of Rape, Stalking, Harassment, and Sexual Assault illuminates the long-overlooked subject of adult female against adult male sex crimes. Combining personal accounts, information on criminal cases, relevant research on adult female against adult male sexual offenses, and statistical data from the FBI and other government sources, the authors comprehensively document how some women can be aggressive sexual predators, just like their male counterparts; highlight the changes in the criminal behavior of women; and provide fascinating stories of true crime as well as shocking revelations about human behavior.

The monograph is based on data from the survey “Intimate partner violence: follow-up research to IVAWS 2003.” Framed by the gender (a-)symmetry hypothesis it offers the possibility of comparing data from two representative samples of men and women as collected during 2012 and 2013. The book demonstrates basic prevalence of the intimate partner violence in respect of both forms, the physical violence and the psychological abuse. It deals with contexts and consequences including a reaction of victims as well. The monograph has covered also actual data on stalking as a new phenomenon in a transforming society.

Stalked: The Human Target is a detailed account of the effects of stalking, which is experienced by a shockingly high proportion of the population. Celebrities like David Letterman and Madonna are the highest profile targets of stalkers, but ordinary people are also targeted, harassed and bullied.With the assistance of forensic psychologists who have worked with stalkers and their targets, and lawyers and police who have represented and protected the people pursued, the author explores the psychopathology of stalkers, surveys the laws that deal with stalking behaviours and looks at cyberstalking. In the final section, Rachel Cassidy discusses how to survive a stalker and build a new life of achievement and hope.Stalked is a perceptive analysis of stalking from the inside – told by the targets, the stalkers, and the experts who deal with the havoc wreaked by the people who harass or persecute others with unwanted and obsessive attention.