College of Arts and Sciences

On this week’s episode of Segue, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville’s weekly radio program exploring the lives and work of the people on campus and beyond, College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) Dean Kevin Leonard, PhD, interviews Ekaterina Gorislavsky, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Criminal Justice Studies.

This episode of Segue airs at 9 a.m. on Sunday, Aug. 29. Listeners can tune into WSIE 88.7 FM The Sound or siue.edu/wsie.

Before joining the SIUE faculty in fall 2016, Gorislavsky earned a master of public policy administration (MPPA) in 2007 and a PhD in criminology and criminal justice in 2014 from the University of Missour­i–St. Louis (UMSL). Her teaching interests include, but are not limited to, research methods in criminology and criminal justice, quantitative data analysis, victimization rates and trends, victim participation in the criminal justice system, services for victims of crime, and capital punishment.

 “Welcome to Segue, Dr. Gorislavsky,” begins Leonard. “How did you become interested in criminology and criminal justice?”

“To be honest, it has always been an interest of mine in the form of detective stories and shows, true crime stories and shows,” says Gorislavsky. “But it took a while for it to become my formal education and career choice.

“I have always had quite diverse academic interests and in middle and high school, it was very hard for me to pick one thing to focus on. When it came to college, it was challenging to choose a major.”

Gorislavsky earned a bachelor’s in linguistics and American studies and completed her thesis on the concept of mystery in detective genre. After receiving her MPPA with UMSL, she knew she wanted to continue her education and had to choose between law school and a PhD. Ultimately her acceptance into the highly competitive criminal justice and criminology PhD program at UMSL sealed her choice for her career path.

“Was there a pivotal moment in which you realized that you wanted to devote your career to criminology and criminal justice?” asks Leonard.

“When I was accepted into the PhD program, I stopped looking at it as a side interest, but as an attractive career choice,” Gorislavsky explains. “For a while, I was simply enjoying being a student and learning new things, but then at a certain point I needed to stop and start thinking about what I wanted to do as a working professional.”

Gorislasky goes on to discuss how during her assistantship with Janet Lauritsen, PhD, Curators’ Distinguished professor of criminology and criminal justice at UMSL, she became even more interested in the field of victimization and the magnitude of aspects that are involved.

“How have your personal experiences influenced your career?” Leonard inquires.

“As a woman, knowing other women who have been affected by sexual victimization in a variety of ways,” Gorislavsky replies, “brought more determination and passion towards what I’m doing in terms of my research activity, trying to find the answers that eventually would help prevent or minimize the rates of sexual victimization.”

“What are the questions that have guided your research?” Leonard asks.

“In terms of victimization, primarily sexual victimization, one of the biggest aspects that requires a lot of study and answers is reporting, because this is the most underreported crime,” says Gorislavsky.

She estimates the most optimistic estimate would be around 30 percent of sexual victimization cases are reported to the police, and therefore, the biggest question is why so many victims would not report.

Another aspect she and her colleagues have been researching is looking at the link between legal consciousness, or the ability of a person to understand what behaviors are actually illegal, and legal mobilization, or what actions someone is willing to take upon understanding the illegal behavior.

Tune in at 9 a.m. on Sunday, Aug. 29, to WSIE 88.7 The Sound to hear the entire conversation.