Janet Rosenberg describes herself as tenacious. Thrown back into the workforce after a divorce, she set her sights on a PhD in psychology. She wanted to become an expert, “to actually make a difference,” in the area of sexual abuse.
“Earlier, I thought for sure I would specialize in domestic violence,” she recalls. However, as she worked with adolescent victims of abuse, she became more and more fascinated with the question of resilience—the striking ability of so many victims to bounce back and recover. “There were exceptions,” she says, “and those were often the victims of sexual abuse.”
After earning her master’s degree, Rosenberg decided to work in the field of abuse to see if this is what she wanted to pursue. “I was unable to get answers from others in the field regarding effective treatment for children and adolescents, so I decided to return for my PhD so I could add to the research in this area.”
Simply to maintain her license, she enrolled in two classes at Capella. The rigor and quality of the courses made an immediate impression, and the online interaction led her to the answers she was seeking. The experience felt like “a wraparound,” she says. “I was getting instantaneous feedback from all areas: pharmacology, behavioral, biological.”
Rosenberg’s dissertation research carries forward her passion to help young girls dealing with self-destructive behaviors related to sexual abuse. “I may not get the whole picture right the first time around in this research, but I will continue to do research with this population, because I care about the plight of abused women and children,” she says.
“With the master’s degree, I was getting there. But it’s the PhD research that really put everything together for me.”