Jayden Varline, a PhD student and research assistant in the Criminal Justice & Criminology department at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, was always inquisitive. As a teenager, she stumbled across news coverage of the Casey Anthony trial and shows like “Criminal Minds.” It was her introduction to criminology and piqued her curiosity about how humans operate.
“I think sometimes we engage in a little too much of the sensationalized pop culture true crime,” Varline said. “But it really drew me to the topic from a young age.”
Her inquisitiveness led her to major in psychology. She loved how it provided answers and motivators behind human behavior. Psychology informs the crime data she spends her days analyzing as a graduate student — whether it’s intricate crime maps or the results of a survey.
“You have to see the overall picture of a person to understand them and relate to them,” she said.
Uncovering victim blaming
Varline works with UWM professors on a number of research projects each semester. But she’s most driven by her work studying sexual assault on college campuses.
She understands the impact of sexual assault on survivors and the importance of preventing assaults. It’s something that touched her life as a young woman. “I have several close friends who have been assaulted and, really, that’s why I have become so passionate about this research,” she said.
Her passion helped her convince four universities to send a survey on sexual assault to over 75,000 students for her dissertation.
The confidential questionnaire includes queries on potential victim-blaming beliefs and bystander responses, which Varline says are understudied. “I was curious if we’re doing enough to change mindsets around victim-blaming,” she said.
The large sample size showed that victim-blaming is still prevalent, especially when the survivor was intoxicated. For example, when asked how much respondents would blame themselves if they were sexually assaulted, the majority reported high levels of self-blame.
These attitudes may play a role in unreported assaults, too. “People who report their sexual assault are put through scrutiny, and nothing comes of it a lot of the time,” Varline said.
The full study, which also includes findings on less-studied groups, like LGBTQ+ people and men who are sexually assaulted, will be published later in 2025.
Impact on college campuses
The National Sexual Violence Resource Center estimates that one in five women will experience an attempted or completed rape in their lifetime and nearly a quarter of men experience some form of sexual violence.
To combat those statistics, all incoming Universities of Wisconsin students are required to take online modules on bystander intervention in the first six weeks of classes. The training helps students recognize harmful situations and how to respond in a way that helps the victim.
Varline is optimistic that the classes might reduce sexual assault on campus, she also thinks more can be done. “I would love to have universities look at my research and realize that they can improve their bystander trainings,” Varline said. “Maybe make it a one-credit course that can be taken across a semester.”
While Varline hopes her research makes a difference in the future, she’s honoring survivors today and wants them to know: “You’re not the product of the worst thing that’s happened to you.”
