From the Back Cover
The expert research of School Shootings: International Research, Case Studies, and Concepts for Prevention goes beyond simple "violent teen culture creates violent students" constructs to present current theories and findings, a diverse range of case studies, and examples of successful prevention programs. (Instructive cases that fall outside the general template, such as an early female shooter and a Samurai sword attack, are also included for additional insights.) Contributors from a variety of disciplines thoughtfully explore the role of media in conceptualizing school shootings and shooters for the public, the social nuances of "cool kids" versus outsiders, and the construction of male socialization for multifaceted coverage of this growing phenomenon. Among the featured topics:
- The relevance of fantasy in school shootings.
- Thirty-five school shootings: trends, patterns, typology.
- Legitimated adolescent violence: lessons from Columbine.
- School shooters and their followers on the Web.
- The Virginia Student Threat Assessment Guidelines: a science-based prevention strategy.
- School-level crisis management when a shooting incident occurs.
A groundbreaking work that opens up possibilities for future studies and interdisciplinary and cross-cultural collaboration, School Shootings is imperative reading for researchers in criminology and criminal justice, especially with an interest in lifecourse studies and violence prevention/intervention. It will also be ofconsiderable interest to researchers in youth-related fields, including child and school psychology, and education.
Nils Böckler is a member of the graduate college Group-focused Enmity which is founded by the German National Science Foundation and associated with the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence at Bielefeld University. In his PhD-project (science of education) he deals with patterns of online-hate and online-radicalization with a main focus on juveniles.
Thorsten Seeger is a member of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence at Bielefeld University. From a background of educational science his main scholarly interests lie in the fields of traumatic childhood experiences, attachment theory, socialization, and violence research. He deepened his knowledge in psychoanalytic ideas and methods during a study stay at the University of Vienna.
Dr. Peter Sitzer has studied science of education at Bielefeld University. Since 2002 he is member of the Faculty of Educational Science at the Bielefeld University. His main research interests are theories of socialization, youth violence, right-wing extremism, media and violence, and cyber bullying.
Wilhelm Heitmeyer is professor of socialization and director of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Research on Conflict and Violence at Bielefeld University. His research interests concentrate on violence, social disintegration, right-wing extremism, and ethnic-cultural conflicts. He is editor of the International Handbook of Violence Research (co-edited with John Hagan), and editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Conflict and Violence (with D. Massey et al.).
