Stalking Behaviors: typology and manifestations

Abstract

Stalking behaviors are considered every stalker's manifestations towards the victim, running through public and private spaces and occurring through the physical and virtual environments. The stalker is the one who persecutes, harasses and causes damage to the victim 's life in an incessant and insistent way. The aim of this study was to investigate, bracket and name the various types of the stalking behaviors based on the experience of six young women. A sociodemographic questionnaire and a semi-structured interview were applied. Thematic Analysis method was used. They were divided in 3 main thematics: typical behaviors, threatening behaviors and bizarre behaviors. The typical ones were characterized mainly by the persecutions, as the face-to-face approaches and inconvenient communications; the threatening ones by threats made by the stalker to harm the victim, either against some aspect of their lives or even a suicidal threat; and the bizarre ones, specified by its eccentricity, as hyper-personalized gift delivery, peculiar affection statements and imitative behaviors. It is understood that all of the related behaviors cause diverse prejudices toward the victims. It points out the need for extra attention of future studies, due to the lack of this thematic in the literature.