Jessica L Shaw, Ph.D

Jessica Shaw, PhD, is a community psychologist, with specializations in evaluation, and organizational change and development. Her research focuses on improving within and between system responses to sexual assault by relying on community partnerships to facilitate empirically-informed, sustainable change. Dr. Shaw’s work is guided by a firm commitment to social justice and action. She has published on the criminal justice and medical system responses to sexual assault, the national problem of unsubmitted sexual assault kits, the importance of systems-based approaches to research and action, advanced research methods, policy change, and evaluation. Dr. Shaw’s work has been funded by the U.S. Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women, National Institute of Justice, and the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority. She has been invited to present her research at the White House and has served as subject matter expert on several national committees focused on improving system responses to sexual assault. Prior to joining the community and prevention research program in the psychology department at UIC, Dr. Shaw was an assistant professor in the Boston College School of Social Work, and a visiting fellow with the National Institute of Justice.

Shaw, J. (2019). Teaching note: A call for including theories of evaluation in program evaluation courses taught in schools of social work. Journal of Social Work Education, 55(3), 596-601.

Shaw, J., Feeney, H., & Campbell, R. (2019). Never too early to start: Training graduate students for policy work. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 89(4), 426-433.

Shaw, J., & Lee, H. (2019). Race and the criminal justice system response to sexual assault: A systematic review. American Journal of Community Psychology, 64(1-2), 255-276.

Shaw, J., Campbell, R., Cain, D., & Feeney, H. (2017). Beyond surveys and scales: How rape myths manifest in sexual assault police records. Psychology of Violence, 7(4), 602-614.

Shaw, J., Campbell, R., & Cain, D. (2016). The view from inside the system: How police explain their response to sexual assault. American Journal of Community Psychology, 58(3-4), 446-462.

Shaw, J., Campbell, R., Hagstrom, J., O’Reilly, L., Kreiger, G., Cain, D., & Nye, J. (2016). Bringing research into practice: An evaluation of Michigan’s pilot sexual assault kit (SAK). Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 31(8), 1476-1500.

Shaw, J., & Janulis, P. (2016). Re-evaluating sexual violence prevention through bystander education: A latent growth curve approach. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 31(16), 2729-2750.

Shaw, J., McLean, K., Taylor, B. Swartout, K., & Querna, K. (2016). Commentary: Beyond resilience: Why we need to look at systems too. Psychology of Violence, (6)1, 34-41.

Shaw, J., & Campbell, R. (2014). The “process” of process use: Methods for longitudinal assessment in a multi-site evaluation. American Journal of Evaluation, 35(2), 250-260.

Shaw, J., & Campbell, R. (2013). Predicting sexual assault kit (SAK) submission among adolescent rape cases treated in a forensic nurse examiner program. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 28(18), 3400-3417.

Massachusetts SANE Program Adolescent Taskforce

Massachusetts SANE program SANE and teleSANE Expansion Advisory Group

Community Toolbox Advisor

Ph.D. in Ecological-Community Psychology, Michigan State University, 2014
M.A. in Ecological-Community Psychology, Michigan State University, 2012
B.S. in Psychology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2009

American Evaluation Association

American Psychological Association

American Society of Criminology

Society for Community Research and Action

Society for Social Work and Research

Shaw, J., Meunier-Sham, J., & Re, C. (2019, April). Adolescent sexual assault: Identifying & overcoming challenges through coordinated responses. Presented at the End Violence Against Women International Conference on Sexual Assault, Intimate Partner Violence, and Increasing Access, San Diego, CA.

Shaw, J. (2018, November). Invited Training: Adolescent Sexual Assault: Prevalence, Dynamics, and Improving our Response. Training provided for the Greater New England Chapter (GNEC) of the International Association of Forensic Nurses (IAFN) Forensics in Everyday Practice VII: Annual Multidisciplinary Conference for Law Enforcement, Health Professionals, & Advocates, Newton, MA.

Shaw, J. (2018, November). Invited Training: Procedural Justice: What It Is, Why It Matters, and How We Can Use It. Training provided for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (MDPH) Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) Update Training, Framingham, MA.

Shaw, J. (2017, November). Race matters: The use and impact of theory in operationalizing the construct of race. In The weaponization of evaluation and the opportunities for mutual liberation: Mobilizing knowledge of social justice and race in evaluation work. Paper presented at the American Evaluation Association Annual Conference, Washington, D.C.

Shaw, J., Krieger, G., Cain, D., Campbell, R., & Harrison, A. (2017, April). Beyond the rape kit: Improving all aspects of the sexual assault investigation. Paper presented at the End Violence Against Women International Conference on Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, and Systems Change, Orlando, FL.

Shaw, J. (2017, February). Invited Plenary: The view from inside the system: How police explain their response to sexual assault. Plenary presented at Battered Women’s Justice Project’s Conference: What Works: Identifying and Preventing Gender Bias in the Criminal Justice System Response to Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, Jacksonville, FL.

Shaw, J. (2016, August). Invited Training: Sexual assault kits: What we have learned and what is next. Training provided to Massachusetts State Police Crime Laboratory, Maynard, MA.

Shaw, J. (2016, August). Invited Talk: Documenting gender bias in the police response to sexual assault. Talk presented at the Office on Violence Against Women Roundtable on Identifying and Preventing Gender Bias in Policing, Washington, D.C.

Shaw, J. (2015 October). Invited Talk: The police response to sexual assault. Talk presented at the White House Domestic Violence Awareness Month Roundtable, The White House, Washington, D.C.

Shaw, J., & Campbell, R. (2015, April). Implementation of the Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner Toolkit: Agent of change in the criminal justice system response to sexual assault, Part I. Paper presented at the End Violence Against Women International Conference on Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, and Campus Responses, New Orleans, LA.