NCJ Number
213279
Journal
Violence and Victims Volume: 21 Issue: 1 Dated: February 2006 Pages: 91-100
Date Published
February 2006
Length
10 pages
Annotation
This study explored college students’ understandings of the specific behaviors that comprise stalking, with a focus on the influence of gender and personal knowledge.
Abstract
The results indicated that gender and personal experience impacted ratings of stalking behavior. Men with personal experience of stalking were more likely to rate mild stalking scenarios as stalking behavior than men without personal experience of stalking. However, personal experience had no impact on women’s ratings of stalking behavior. Overall, women were more likely to rate both mild and severe stalking scenarios as stalking behaviors. Participants were 60 female and 42 male college students recruited from an introductory psychology course. Participants were asked to rate a list of potential stalking behaviors that ranged from mild, ambiguous examples to more severe examples of stalking behavior. Statistical analysis techniques, including MANOVA, examined the interaction of gender and personal knowledge on perceptions of stalking behaviors. Future research is planned to examine how perceptions of stalking become activated and how differences in these perceptions might affect memory, attention, and interpretation of the events. Table, references, appendix