Survivor Perceptions of Intimate Partner Stalking Victimization Risk and Response

• In Event: Roundtable: Domestic, Gendered, and Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract

While current research on intimate partner stalking (IPS) focuses largely on the development and application of newer risk assessment tools and safety planning methods, a crucial element to developing future IPS prevention and response is understanding how victims interpret risk during and post-victimization. This research takes an interpretive phenomenological approach to risk and marks the first application of Ulrich Beck’s (1992, 2006) world risk society thesis to IPS. The purpose of this research is to reframe current understandings of stalking risk in the contemporary world, identifying the need to address intersections of gender-based violence and technology in an era of modernity. Based on 20 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with female survivors of IPS in Canada, the present study explores survivor interpretations of IPS risk, identifying the role of informal communities in victim safety, and the role of perceived risk in help-seeking behaviour. Survivors of IPS wish to challenge current narratives and assumptions about risk in the digital age, particularly around reliance on informal sources in response to formal services being unable/unwilling to help. Findings highlight the importance of future research attending to processes of interpretation and construction in how risk is perceived as this influences help-seeking and formal social services response.

Author

• Olivia Peters, University of Guelph