Stalking as paranoid attachment: A typological and dynamic model

Abstract

Stalking encompasses a wide range of behavioral patterns, risk factors, interpersonal dynamics, and dangerousness. To account for these diverse phenomena, we propose that stalking behavior is best conceptualized by a dynamic interaction of attachment styles and psychodynamic phenomena. This paper articulates a model that explains stalking behavior within the framework of attachment theory. Four prototypical configurations of stalkers and their victims are developed. Each configuration is discussed in terms of a pattern of internal representations, affective constellations, combinations of aggression and narcissism, and potential for future violence. The four configurations proposed here are maintained through stalkers' over ideational linkage fantasies and projective identifications, which range from shame-prone and needy idealization to malevolent torment of the victim. Our model arrays erotomanic, jealous, and persecutory attachments along a continuum of increasingly paranoid and pathological identifications. We argue that these prototypical attachment configurations provide a theoretically driven means of differentiating phases of stalking, and as such provide useful leads in the empirical study and clinical assessment, treatment, and management of stalkers.

Keywords:

• Stalking
• attachment
• paranoid
• violence
• psychodynamic

Acknowledgements

A precursor to this paper was presented by the senior author at the 1998 mid-winter meeting of the Society for Personality Assessment. We extend our grateful appreciation to Julia E. Grant and Julie C. Dunsmore for helpful comments on an earlier draft of the article. Michael R. Bridges provided considerable encouragement and guidance in developing the conceptual links between aggression and attachment. Kevin Reimer, Sheryn Scott, and Jeanne Clevinger also provided important editorial feedback. Lastly we thank the editor and anonymous reviewers for their straightforward and incisive feedback.

The views expressed in this article are solely ours and may not reflect the views of the New York State Office of Mental Health, The Virginia Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse Services or State of California Department of Mental Health.

Notes

1 This is a term borrowed directly from Buddhist psychology (see, e.g., Trungpa, 2001).