Australian researchers published a study in the American Journal of Psychiatry which found that female stalkers were just as predatory and dangerous as their male counterparts.
The researchers looked at individuals at a mental health clinic who had stalked their victims for at least four weeks and made at least 10 attempts to communicate with their victims. They found 150 males and 40 females who fit that definition. What they found surprised them,
Contrary to popular assumption, the female stalkers were no less likely than their male counterparts to threaten their victims or to attack their person or property. For instance, one female stalker damaged the sports car of her victim, her former fiance. Another painted obscene messages on the fence of her victim’s home. Nine of the 40 female stalkers assaulted their victims, and the nature of the assaults did not differ much from that of male stalkers, except that the women did not commit any sexual assaults.
The major differences between male and female stalkers is that women were just as likely to choose women as men as targets of the stalking and significantly more female stalkers wanted to establish a romantic relationship with the person they were stalking.
One of the researchers, Dr. Paul Mullen, told Psychiatric News, “There is no reason to presume that the impact of being stalked by a female would be any less devastating than that of a man.”
Source:
Don’t underestimate dangerousness of female stalkers, study urges. Joan Arehart, Treichel, Psychiatric News, Feb. 1, 2002.