Warning Behaviors

The typology of eight proximal warning behaviors for targeted violence was first introduced a decade ago. Since that time, a number of studies have continued to support its interrater reliability and its criterion, discriminant, and predictive validity. Among the warning behaviors, the three most validated in discriminating between attackers and nonattackers are pathway, identification, and last resort. All of the other warning behaviors—fixation, novel aggression, energy burst, leakage, and directly communicated threat—are found at various frequencies throughout all the samples tested to date, including intimate partner homicide perpetrators, school shooters, adult mass murderers, public figure attackers, and lone actor terrorists.