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Research

Concepts and Case Studies in Threat Management, Calhoun and Weston, the University of Nebraska Public Policy Center

Thank you ATAP (Association of Threat Assessment Professionals) http://www.atapworldwide.org/

In ATAP's words:

The latest book by Calhoun and Weston titled Concepts and Case Studies in Threat Management, published by CRC Press.  It is available online at Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble.com, or directly from the publisher.  The book identifies and describes in detail nine new concepts that affect the modern practice of threat management.  These concepts include:

• Case Dynamics and Intervention Synergy

• The Need-to-Knows

• Inhibitors and Their Impacts

• Differences Among the Various Venues of Violence

• Cutbacks, Silos, Bunkers, and Myopic Management Strategies

Each concept is illustrated by actual case studies. The book includes two appendices, the first publication of the “Glossary of Threat Management Terminology,” compiled jointly by Calhoun and Weston, the University of Nebraska Public Policy Center, and ATAP, and ATAP’s Professionals’ Code of Ethical Conduct.

As always with Calhoun and Weston’s work, Concepts and Case Studies in Threat Management provides practical approaches for the threat management practitioner.

Other books and research papers:

Active Shooters – The Quiet Threat that Dwells in Your Backyard

http://www.coloradotech.edu/~/media/CTU/Files/ThoughtLeadership/CTU_Active_Shooter_White_Paper.ashx

Source: Nada Morag PhD, University Dean of Security Studies, Colorado Technical University

A Study of Active Shooter Events in the United States Between 2000 and 2013

https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/office-of-partner-engagement/active-shooter-incidents/a-study-of-active-shooter-incidents-in-the-u.s.-2000-2013

Source: The FBI

Suicide by mass murder: Masculinity, aggrieved entitlement, and rampage school shootings

http://www.academia.edu/3431764/Suicide_by_mass_murder_Masculinity_aggrieved_entitlement_and_rampage_school_shootings

Source: Rachel Kalish and Michael Kimmel. Department of Sociology, SUNY at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY, USA

Analyzing Language in Suicide Notes and Legacy Tokens:

Investigating Clues to Harm of Self and Harm to Others in Writing

Michael J. Egnoto and Darrin J. Griffin

Online First Publication, January 19, 2016. http://dx.doi.org/10.1027/0227-5910/a000363

CITATION

Egnoto, M. J., & Griffin, D. J. (2016, January 19). Analyzing Language in Suicide Notes and

Legacy Tokens: Investigating Clues to Harm of Self and Harm to Others in Writing. Crisis.

Advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1027/0227-5910/a000363

Some highlights…

Suicidal Ideation

Unlike for legacy tokens, a robust body of research exists that has employed LIWC and linguistic analysis tools to investigate the relationship between suicidal ideation and writing. Work on suicidal poets found increased reference to the self as compared with nonsuicidal poets (Stirman & Pennebaker, 2001). Additionally, future tense usage, positive emotion, and social references increased in notes from completed suicides as opposed to attempted suicides (Handelman & Lester, 2007). Echoing the use of positive emotion in suicide attempts, Lester (2007) also found an increase in positive emotion words immediately prior to completed suicide. Finally, additional work revealed that references to the self as well as positive emotion words increased as the time to completed suicide counted down to the end of the individual’s life (Lester, 2009).

Writing associated with negative emotions, anger, personal pronoun usage, and future tense use provides a foundation for investigating student writings in academic settings, thereby offering crisis responders another evaluative tool. Specifically, the use of negative emotion (H1) and anger (H2) is particularly relevant for differentiating those who have harm ideation versus other ideation from either suicidal or student populations. Each of these characteristics is exhibited 2 (H1) to 4 (H2) times as often in spree killer writings than in either suicidal or general student texts. Personal pronoun usage (H4) and future tense usage (H5) in suicide notes manifested even stronger than negative emotion (H1) and anger (H2) did in spree killer writings. Personal pronouns were nearly 3 times as likely in suicidal writings than in other writings, and future tense usage was nearly 4 times as likely in suicidal writings as compared with other types of writing. For H1 and H2 of shooter writings, and H4 and H5 of suicidal writings, these variables only distinguish that particular behavior from the others – there is very little bleed through. In other words, spree killers focus on negative emotion and anger, whereas suicidal and student writings exhibit similar levels of this behavior. Conversely, suicidal individuals strongly emphasize personal pronoun usage and future tense orientation, whereas killers and students are about equal in this regard. It could be the case that these variables tap into a deeper cognitive construct

Journal Article #3

(I do appreciate the eight typologies):

Some warning behaviors discriminate between school shooters and other students of concern.

Authors: Meloy, J. Reid, Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, San Diego School of Medicine, San Diego, CA, US, reidmeloy@gmail.com 
Hoffmann, Jens, Institute of Psychology and Threat Management, Darmstadt, Germany
Roshdi, Karoline, Institute of Psychology and Threat Management, Darmstadt, Germany
Guldimann, Angela, University Hospital of Psychiatry, Zurich, Switzerland

Address: Meloy, J. Reid, Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, San Diego, CA, US, 92093, reidmeloy@gmail.com 

Source: Journal of Threat Assessment and Management, Vol 1(3), Sep, 2014. pp. 203-211.

Warning behaviors contain within them dynamic rather than static variables, the former typically offering more substantial contributions to the assessment of short-term violence risk (Gray et al., 2004; Nicholls, Brink, Desmarais, Webster, & Martin, 2006; Skeem & Mulvey, 2001). The typology was generated to carefully define and systematize such patterns. The original study reviewed in detail the previous research, which attempted to identify these acute and dynamic variables among attackers and assassins of celebrities, politicians, and other public figures; psychiatric patients; adolescent mass murderers and school shooters; adult mass murderers; spousal homicide perpetrators; workplace attackers; and federal judicial threateners and attackers (Meloy et al., 2012). A subsequent study graphically displayed some of these different configurations (Meloy et al., 2014) in various domains of targeted violence. The patterns identified in the typology were gleaned from the research on targeted or intended violence, discussions with colleagues, and the casework experience of the original authors. It is a rationally derived typology.

1.     Pathway warning behavior—any behavior that is part of research, planning, preparation, or implementation of an attack (Calhoun & Weston, 2003; Fein & Vossekuil, 1998a, 1998b, 1999).

2.     Fixation warning behavior—any behavior that indicates an increasingly pathological preoccupation with a person or a cause (Mullen et al., 2009). It is measured by (a) increasing perseveration on the person or cause; (b) increasingly strident opinion; (c) increasingly negative characterization of the object of fixation; (d) impact on the family or other associates of the object of fixation, if present and aware; and (e) angry emotional undertone. It is typically accompanied by social or occupational deterioration.

3.     Identification warning behavior—any behavior that indicates a psychological desire to be a “pseudocommando” (Dietz, 1986; Knoll, 2010), have a “warrior mentality” (Hempel, Meloy, & Richards, 1999), closely associate with weapons or other military or law-enforcement paraphernalia, identify with previous attackers or assassins, or identify oneself as an agent to advance a particular cause or belief system.

4.     Novel aggression warning behavior—an act of violence that appears unrelated to any targeted-violence pathway warning behavior committed for the first time. Such behaviors may be engaged to test the ability (de Becker, 1997) of the subject to actually do the violent act, and may be a measure of response tendency, i.e., the motivation to act on the environment (Hull, 1952), or a behavioral tryout (MacCulloch, Snowden, Wood, & Mills, 1983). When homicide occurs within this warning behavior, it may be “proof of kill” (G. Deisinger, personal communication, February, 2011).

5.     Energy burst warning behavior—an increase in the frequency or variety of any noted activities related to the target, even if the activities themselves are relatively innocuous, usually in the days or weeks before the attack (Odgers et al., 2009).

6.     Leakage warning behavior—the communication to a third party of an intent to do harm to a target through an attack (Meloy & O’Toole, 2011).

7.     Last resort warning behavior—evidence of a “violent-action imperative” or “time imperative” (Mohandie & Duffy, 1999); increasing desperation or distress through declaration in word or deed, forcing the individual into a position of last resort. There is no alternative other than violence, and the consequences are justified (de Becker, 1997). The subject feels trapped (S. White, personal communication, October, 2010).

8.     Directly communicated threat warning behavior—the communication of a direct threat to the target or law enforcement beforehand. A threat is a written or oral communication that implicitly or explicitly states a wish or intent to damage, injure, or kill the target or individuals symbolically or actually associated with the target.

Each of these eight patterns has within it discrete behaviors that have often been considered risk variables for targeted violence. For example, within the pattern of last resort could be the appearance of “final acts” as enumerated by Calhoun and Weston (2003); within the pattern of identification could be accumulation of weapons and other military paraphernalia as noted by Dietz (1986); and within the pattern of leakage could be multiple postings to social media in the hours before the planned attack, as discussed by Meloy and O’Toole (2011). The typology appears to have face validity, and may capture most of the universe of warning behaviors in intended and targeted violence which are now known and are described in the literature (see Meloy et al., 2012, 2014). However, further empirical research is necessary to advance understanding of its reliability and validity. Perhaps the most important research question is whether the typology has any predictive validity in relation to acts of targeted violence. In other words, does it serve a useful purpose in the real world by classifying warning behaviors that have preceded acts of targeted violence, and discriminating between those who prompt the concern of threat assessors but have shown no intention to act, and those who carry it out?

Comparing the USSS Safe School Initiative Findings to the German School Shooters

Almost all U.S. attackers (93%) planned and prepared their school shootings, a finding very similar to the German attackers, who all followed a pathway warning behavior, including the last steps of research, planning, preparation, and implementation (see Figure 1).

The very high frequency of U.S. school shooters who exhibited a history of suicidal attempts or thoughts (78%) was the same frequency as last resort thinking in the German sample of school shooters. This warning behavior is described as increasing desperation or distress through declaration in word or deed, forcing the individual into a position of last resort. Suicidal ideation appears to be a strong behavioral marker for last resort warning behavior—and the mediating variable may be depression Although last resort is a pattern, and suicidal ideation is an example of a more discrete clinical behavior, the relationship is worth contemplation given the finding that last resort had the second largest effect size (.855) as a discriminator between the two German groups. In almost every case in the U.S. and in Germany (Hoffmann, Roshdi, & Robertz, 2009), the offender experienced major losses before the attacks, which may be one discrete cause of this warning behavior. Again, it may not be the loss per se, but how the loss is emotionally processed by the subject.

Leakage was present in virtually all the German cases in the two samples, and also in 81% of the U.S. school shootings; at least one person, as a result of leakage, had information that the attacker was thinking about or planning the school assault. The rate of directly communicated threats was relatively low in both samples: 17% in the U.S. sample and 11% in the German sample. Neither directly communicated threat nor leakage distinguished the two groups, yet they are often the point of investigative entry into a case—especially leakage, given its higher frequency—as the first evidence of risk of targeted violence. Most cases in which leakage is present, however, do not result in targeted violence, but leakage is expected among most school shooters (Meloy & O’Toole, 2011; Vossekuil et al., 2002).

The analysis of warning behaviors yielded important findings. School shooters in the U.S. and Germany have produced similar warning behavior profiles despite differences in geography, language, culture, and history: frequent pathway, leakage, and last resort warning behaviors; and infrequent directly communicated threats. Pathway, fixation, and identification profiles were prominent and quite similar when the German school shooters and German and U.S. public figure attackers were compared (Hoffmann et al., 2011; Meloy et al., 2008; Meloy et al., 2014). This means that the results of this study not only have significance for Germany, but also for the U.S. and perhaps other Western countries.

Comparing the German School Shooters and Other Students of Concern

Our most important finding, however, is the striking differences in warning behaviors between the German school shooters and other students of concern. Whereas both school shooters and students of concern frequently leaked their intent to others, the warning behaviors of pathway, fixation, identification, novel aggression, last resort—and to a lesser degree, energy burst—distinguished the school shooters from those who showed no evidence of intent to act, and were suggestive patterns for high risk cases, especially in combination, although this latter assertion has been untested. Directly communicated threats may be a negative correlate for an attack to be carried out in some cases; however, 11% of the attackers did communicate a direct threat. This is a similar finding to the public figure attack research (Meloy et al., 2008), but all direct threats should be taken seriously, especially given the contemporary work of Warren et al. (2014) concerning homicidal threats. The interactive and contingent nature of the warning behaviors typology may be operationally useful for single case assessment, but needs to be statistically tested with larger samples and more sophisticated decision-tree and regression statistical analyses.

Workplace violence – great resource from NIOSH:

http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/violence/default.html