Dr. Rachel McNealey is an Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice with her Ph.D. in criminology from Penn State University. Her research focuses on cybervictimization events and cyberoffending behavior, with the goal of tying new forms of crime to traditional theories of crime. Her work has been published in the Journal of Crime and Justice, the Journal of Interpersonal Violence, and the Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. Her non-academic experience includes working in the digital forensics lab at the Joint Electronic Crimes Task Force in Tuscaloosa, Alabama as well as their Network Intrusion Lab and security group Project Halo. As an early career scholar, her work aims to investigate emerging forms of crime with established methods and theories to produce actionable, practice-oriented findings.
Selected publications:
- McNealey, R.L., & Ghazi-Tehrani, A. K. (Forthcoming) Risky Digital Behavior or Risky Digital Places? Victimization Risk Perception and Evaluation on the Internet. Journal of Crime and Justice.
- Vanhee, A. J., & McNealey, R. (2023). Individual residence and identity theft: how residential characteristics shape exposure and risk of offline and online identity theft victimization. Journal of Financial Crime.
- Said, I., & McNealey, R. L. (2023). Nonconsensual Distribution of Intimate Images: Exploring the Role of Legal Attitudes in Victimization and Perpetration. Journal of interpersonal violence, 38(7-8), 5430-5451.