Assistant Professor · Regis University
I study how people give meaning to lived experiences of violent victimization, and how we collectively decide what counts as violence.
My research and my teaching both begin from epistemic injustice: social inequality leaves some people with far fewer resources to make sense of the most important things that happen to them.
The Question
The concepts available to understand an experience are not distributed equally. That problem runs through all of my work: a woman deciding what happened to her, a village misreading its own attitudes, a national dataset that never asked about disability.
Three Themes
My systematic review of women’s acknowledgment of intimate partner violence found the same pattern in every study reviewed: some women who met formal definitions of victimization did not describe their experiences as victimization. Non-acknowledgment is not rare, and it can influence who gets help.
Across eight villages in rural Uganda, most men neither endorsed nor perpetrated intimate partner violence. yet nearly half believed most other men did. Men holding these misperceived norms were significantly more likely to endorse and perpetrate violence themselves.
Definitions, instruments, and reporting practices decide which experiences of harm become visible at all. My work on disability and violence, school fairness and bullying, and racial microaggressions traces how those choices shape what types of violence we acknowledge.
Selected Work
Sriken, J. Journal of Family Violence
Perkins, J. M., Nyakato, V., Kakuhikire, B., Sriken, J., et al. Journal of Interpersonal Violence
Overstreet, S. M., Sriken, J., Lapsey, D. S., & McNeeley, S. Crime & Delinquency
Mueller, C. O., Forber-Pratt, A. J., & Sriken, J. Journal of Social Issues
Teaching
Seventeen undergraduate research assistants have worked in my lab since 2024. Four students have presented our work at the Rocky Mountain Psychological Association, the American Psychological Association, and the Western Society of Criminology.
Press & Speaking
Lightning talk. 81st Annual Meeting of the American Society of Criminology, Chicago
Feature. Regis University
Feature. Regis University
Research collaboration, academic inquiries, speaking invitations, media requests, or a conversation about the work.