Lauren Vollinger, MA, PhD
Affiliation: RTI International
Lauren Vollinger is a community psychologist, evaluator, consultant, and award-winning community-based researcher. Her work focuses on coordinated systems response to human trafficking. As a consultant, Lauren has partnered with local and state anti-trafficking task forces, schools, and law enforcement to understand the inter-organizational needs of agencies to best support survivors of trafficking in their communities. Lauren’s current research examines the process of exiting the sex industry over time and how intersecting social identities impact survivors’ experiences with formal systems. She also focuses on the role financial abuse and coerced debt play in the lives of people who have experienced sexual exploitation and intimate partner violence. Lauren utilizes an intersectional, trauma-informed, participatory approach to her research methods and emphasizes community engagement and activism to disseminate research findings beyond academic circles. She is also passionate about incorporating the arts and creativity into research methods and social action on human trafficking, which she discussed in her 2020 TedxTalk.
Research Interests:
Coordinated systems-response to human trafficking
Financial abuse & coerced debt
Community-based participatory research methods
Trauma-informed research methods
Intersectionality
Social justice & systems change